Harald zur Hausen

Professor Harald zur Hausen DSc MD is Professor Emeritus and recent Chairman and Scientific Director at the German Cancer Research Centre in Heidelberg, Germany. 2008 was a good year for him, as he was a Gairdner International Awardee (through The Gairdner Foundation) and also won the Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine for ‘for the discovery of the causative role of papilloma viruses in cancer of the cervix which led to the development of a successful HPV vaccine.'

Prof. zur Hausen’s educational and professional career can be summarised as follows:

• he received his M.D. in 1960 from the University of Dusseldorf.
• after further medical training, he was a research fellow first at the University of Dusseldorf 1962-1965.
• he worked under Prof. Werner Henle at the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia from 1966-1969.
• he returned to Germany in 1969 at the University of Wurzburg as a Senior Scientist at the Institute for Virology.
• during 1972-1977, he was the Chairman and Professor in the Institute for Clinical Virology at the University of Erlangen-Nurnberg.
• during 1977-1983, he was the Chairman and Professor at the Institute for Virology at the University of Freiburg.
• he was the Scientific Director and Chairman of the Management Board of the German Cancer Research Center (DKFZ) in Heidelberg from 1983 until 2003.
• in 2003, he became an emeritus professor at the German Cancer Research Center.

Awards for his research include:

• the Robert Koch Prize and Medal in 1975.
• the Charles Mott Prize from the General Motors Cancer Research Foundation in 1986.
• the Paul Ehrlich-Ludwig Darmstatter Prize in 1994.
• the Virchow Medal from the University of Wurzburg in 2000.
• the San Marino Prize for Medicine in 2002.

Since discovering the causative role of papilloma viruses in cervical cancer which led to the development of a successful HPV vaccine, he has:

• continues to run a highly productive laboratory
• published an average of more than five papers per year.