Every year, the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) honors leading young investigators from a range of oncology specialties through the ASCO Foundation, a charitable organization that supports educational programs in cancer care and prevention; facilitates the dissemination of information about cancer and cancer treatment to patients and their families; and supports, encourages, and recognizes excellence in clinical research in the field of oncology. At ASCO's annual meeting this year, ten promising physicians who are beginning their careers at Memorial Sloan-Kettering were among those honored.
Seven winners of Merit Awards were from Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center. These awards are intended to further promote clinical research by young scientists and are given to fellows who are first authors on outstanding meeting abstracts. The winners were Catherine S. Magid Diefenbach, Igor Matushansky, Petra Rietschel, and Karen L. Smith of the Department of Medicine; Fernando J. Bianco, Jr., and David S. Sharp of the Department of Urology; and Kimberly Moore Dalal of the Department of Surgery.
Three winners of Young Investigator Awards were also from Memorial Sloan-Kettering. These awards are given to physicians in their final year of a fellowship program or their first after completing their fellowships. Each recipient gets a one-year grant to begin his or her own investigative studies. The winners were David J. Chung and Raymond D. Meng of the Department of Medicine and Rosandra Kaplan of the Department of Pediatrics.
