A pioneer of cancer research at the Centre for Cancer Immunology has been named a Fellow of the Royal Society.
Sally Ward is a Professor of Molecular Immunology and Director of Translational Immunology. She is internationally recognised for her research using a combination of protein engineering, in vivo studies and fluorescence imaging to develop therapeutics to treat cancer and autoimmunity.
Professor Ward joined the Centre for Cancer Immunology in 2019 from Texas AM University and leads the joint multidisciplinary laboratory. She is currently working on two multi-million research projects – the first, funded by Cancer Research UK, is developing ways of improving the efficiency with which antibody-drug conjugates deliver toxic drugs to cancer cells. The second, funded by the Wellcome Trust, is studying macrophages and how antibodies behave within these cells, with the overall goal of using this information to design molecular approaches to improve the immune response against tumours during immunotherapy.
Professor Ward joins more than 60 other exceptional scientists from around the world who have been elected Fellows and Foreign Members of the Royal Society.
“I am delighted and honoured to have been elected as a Fellow of the Royal Society,” Professor Ward said. “It is extremely gratifying that our research leading to clinically approved antibodies for the treatment of autoimmunity and infectious disease has been recognised in this way. I am indebted to Raimund Ober, with whom I have run a joint laboratory for over 20 years. This collaboration has allowed us to implement highly interdisciplinary approaches to tackle the research problems at hand. I would also like to thank the many post-doctoral fellows, students, research scientists, technical staff and collaborators who have played such important roles in our work over the past several decades.”
Sir Adrian Smith, President of the Royal Society said: “It is an honour to welcome so many outstanding researchers from around the world into the Fellowship of the Royal Society. Through their careers so far, these researchers have helped further our understanding of human disease, biodiversity loss and the origins of the universe.”