E. Premkumar Reddy , Ph.D.

E. Premkumar Reddy, Ph.D., was an investigator at Wistar from 1987 to 1992. Today, he is director of the Fels Institute for Cancer Research and Molecular Biology at Temple University.

Reddy has spent more than two decades studying the molecular basis of cancer. He has focused on four oncogenes—c-myb, c-myc, c-abl and c-ras—that are associated with human cancers. His research has attempted to elucidate the role of such cellular oncogenes in cell growth and differentiation and also to understand how oncogenic activation occurs. This research has resulted in the emergence of potential targeted therapeutics for cancer, which are currently in early development.

He has also focused his research on the analysis of human retroviruses such as HIV. Reddy co-invented a successful commercial diagnostic test for AIDS.

Before joining Wistar in 1987, Reddy held positions at Microbiological Associates in Bethesda, Md.; at the National Cancer Institute, where he became chief of the Molecular Genetics Section; and at the Roche Institute of Molecular Biology in Nutley, N.J. Reddy became director of the Fels Institute for Cancer Research and Molecular Biology in 1992.

He continues to edit Oncogene, a molecular cancer journal that he founded in 1987. He is also the editor of The Oncogene Handbook. In 1993, he received a Scientific Achievement Award from the American Cancer Society.