June 10, 2024
Toronto, Ontario—David M. Goldenberg, MD, known for his pioneering work in monoclonal antibodies and immunotherapy, was awarded the Benedict Cassen Prize during the Society of Nuclear Medicine and Molecular Imaging 2024 Annual Meeting. This honor is awarded every two years by the Education and Research Foundation (ERF) for Nuclear Medicine and Molecular Imaging in recognition of outstanding achievement and work leading to a major advance in nuclear medicine science.
“Dr. Goldenberg has dedicated his career to advancing the diagnosis and treatment of cancer,” said ERF President Peggy Squires, BS, CNMT, FSNMMI-TS. “We honor his work and his extensive contributions to the field.”
During a special plenary session at SNMMI’s Annual Meeting, Goldenberg presented the Cassen Lectureship titled “My Golden Anniversary in Nuclear Medicine, 1974-2024.”
“It is a tremendous honor to receive the Benedict Cassen Prize,” Goldenberg commented. “I have witnessed the growth and contributions of nuclear medicine over the past 50 years and am delighted that the development of radiopharmaceuticals now provides very selective targeting agents that disclose sites of cancer. These agents can now also advance this technology to a more specific and effective therapy, which I believe is providing a renaissance for nuclear medicine. It is benefitting patients with a whole new generation of agents that provide more personalized therapy. Indeed, the pharmaceutical industry has begun to invest substantially in this new class of cancer treatments.”
Goldenberg is the founder and president of the Center for Molecular Medicine and Immunology, now located in Mendham, New Jersey, funded by the National Cancer Institute. From 1983-2017, he was founder, chairman of the board, and chief scientist of Immunomedics, Inc., which developed antibody-based diagnostic imaging and therapeutic agents for cancer and certain autoimmune diseases. There, he was the inventor and principal developer of the antibody-drug conjugate sacituzumab govitecan (Trodelvy), approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration in 2021 for the treatment of metastatic, recurrent triple-negative breast cancer and metastatic, recurrent urothelial cancer. In 2023, it was approved for treatment of HR+/HER2– metastatic breast cancer.
After receiving his medical degree from the University of Heidelberg in Germany and postgraduate training in Erlangen, Dr. Goldenberg had a long academic career as a professor at five U.S. medical schools before founding the Center for Molecular Medicine in 1983. He holds more than 400 scientific patents, has published more than 900 peer-reviewed articles, and has edited two books and 14 journal supplements. He has been on the editorial board of more than 25 medical journals, and his articles have been cited more than 60,000 times in the medical literature.
Dr. Goldenberg is the recipient of numerous awards, including the prestigious National Cancer Institute Outstanding Investigator Award in 1985 and 1992, the British Institute of Radiology 3M Mayneord Memorial Award and Lectureship in 1991, and the SNMMI Paul C. Aebersold Award in 2005, among others.
The Cassen Prize honors Benedict Cassen, whose invention of the rectilinear radioisotope scanner—the first instrument capable of making an image of radiotracer distribution in body organs of living patients—was seminal to the development of clinical nuclear medicine. Goldenberg is the 18th individual to receive this prestigious $25,000 award from the Education and Research Foundation for Nuclear Medicine and Molecular Imaging since 1994.
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About the Society of Nuclear Medicine and Molecular Imaging
The Society of Nuclear Medicine and Molecular Imaging (SNMMI) is an international scientific and medical organization dedicated to advancing nuclear medicine and molecular imaging, vital elements of precision medicine that allow diagnosis and treatment to be tailored to individual patients in order to achieve the best possible outcomes.
SNMMI’s members set the standard for molecular imaging and nuclear medicine practice by creating guidelines, sharing information through journals and meetings and leading advocacy on key issues that affect molecular imaging and therapy research and practice. For more information, visit www.snmmi.org.