Philip Branton

2016 Emeritus Professor

Dr. Philip Branton received a PhD in 1972 from the Department of Medical Biophysics at the Ontario Cancer Institute, University of Toronto, and pursued postdoctoral training at MIT. He was a Professeur adjoint at the Université de Sherbrooke before joining the Cancer Research Group at McMaster University in 1975. From 1990 to 2000 he was the Chair of the Department of Biochemistry at McGill and in 1996 was awarded the Gilman Cheney Professorship. In 2000 he was selected as inaugural Scientific Director of the Institute of Cancer Research of the Canadian Institutes of Health Research. Dr. Branton is the founder and past Chair of the Canadian Cancer Research Alliance (CCRA), the past Chair of the Research Action Group of the Canadian Partnership Against Cancer and a member of the Scientific Advisory Committee of Stand Up 2 Cancer. Dr. Branton has received many accolades over the course of his distinguished career including Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada, Canadian Cancer Society’s R.M. Taylor Medal (2005), CCRA Award for Exceptional Leadership in Cancer Research (2011) and Officer of the Order of Canada (2014). He is well known internationally for his research on human adenoviruses, cell death, protein degradation and tumour suppressors and has published 130 papers in top peer-reviewed journals.