The Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center,located in Seattle, Washington, was establishedin 1975 and is one of the world’s leading cancer research institutes. Its interdisciplinary teams of scientists conduct research in the laboratory, at
patients’ bedsides, and in communities throughout the world to advance the prevention, early detection, and treatment of cancer and other diseases.Center researchers pioneered bone marrow transplantation for leukemia and other blood diseases. This research has cured thousands of patients worldwide and has boosted survival rates
for certain forms of leukemia from zero to as high as 85 percent. The center grew out of the Pacific Northwest Research Foundation, founded in 1956 by Dr. William Hutchinson. The foundation was dedicated to the study of heart surgery, cancer, and diseases of the endocrine system. In 1964, Hutchinson’s brother Fred Hutchinson, who had been a baseball player for the Seattle Rainiers and Detroit Tigers and who later managed the Rainiers, the Tigers, the St. Louis Cardinals, and the Cincinnati Reds, died of lung cancer. The next year, William Hutchinson established the Fred Hutchinson
Cancer Research Center as a division of the Pacific Northwest Research Foundation. The center split off from its parent foundation in 1972, and the physical center was opened in 1975.
The Fred Hutchinson/University of Washington Cancer Consortium is a research collaboration comprising the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, which has been a National Cancer Institute–designated comprehensive cancer center since 1976, and its strong collaborators, the University of Washington and Childrens Hospital and Regional Medical Center. The designation of the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center by the National Cancer Institute as a comprehensive cancer center was expanded to include the consortium in 2003. The consortium brings together nearly
390 faculty member with research interests in basic, clinical, and public health sciences related to cancer, with total National Cancer Institute funding of $129 million in 2006. A multidisciplinary team of world-renowned scientists and humanitarians works together to prevent, diagnose, and treat cancer. Seattle’s reputation as a leader in high technology and biotechnology and the allure of the region’s natural beauty attract the world’s best minds to the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center. Dr. Lee Hartwell is president and director of Seattle’s Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center. He concurrently serves as research professor of genetics with the American Cancer Society and professor of Genome Sciences at the University of Washington. Much of Hartwell’s career was spent studying genes that control cell division in yeast; subsequently, many of these same genes have been found to control cell division in humans and often to be the site of alteration in cancer. He is currently involved in a national and international project to improve methods for discovering protein biomarkers for cancer. Hartwell received the 2001 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine.
Scientific research at the Hutchinson Center is organized into programs, each containing about 10 to 20 faculty members. Most faculty members of the Hutchinson Center participate in several scientific programs. Programs usually have representatives from more than one division, and often from all divisions. Therefore, they constitute the forums for interdisciplinary research and communication. The Basic Sciences Division comprises about 30 independent and highly interactive laboratories pursuing different, yet related, areas of molecular and cellular biology and using a broad range of approaches and experimental systems.
