Michael Smith was a British-born Canadian biochemist and businessman. He shared the 1993 Nobel Prize in Chemistry with Kary Mullis for his work in developing site-directed mutagenesis. Following a PhD in 1956 from the University of Manchester, he undertook postdoctoral research with Har Gobind Khorana at the British Columbia Research Council in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. Subsequently, Smith worked at the Fisheries Research Board of Canada Laboratory in Vancouver before being appointed a professor of biochemistry in the UBC Faculty of Medicine in 1966. Smith's career included roles as the founding director of the UBC Biotechnology Laboratory and the founding scientific leader of the Protein Engineering Network of Centres of Excellence (PENCE). In 1996 he was named Peter Wall Distinguished Professor of Biotechnology. Subsequently, he became the founding director of the Genome Sequencing Centre at the BC Cancer Research Centre.
The Order of British Columbia is a civilian honour for merit in the Canadian province of British Columbia. Instituted in 1989 by Lieutenant Governor David Lam, on the advice of the Cabinet under Premier Bill Vander Zalm, the order is administered by the Governor-in-Council and is intended to honour current or former British Columbia residents for conspicuous achievements in any field, being thus described as the highest honour amongst all others conferred by the British Columbia Crown.
Andrzej Viktor "Andrew" Schally is an American endocrinologist of Polish ancestry, who was a corecipient, with Roger Guillemin and Rosalyn Sussman Yalow, of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine. This award recognized his research in the discovery that the hypothalamus controls hormone production and release by the pituitary gland, which controls the regulation of other hormones in the body. Later in life Schally utilized his knowledge of hypothalamic hormones to research possible methods for birth control and cancer treatment.
Charles H. Hollenberg was a Canadian physician, educator and researcher.
Victor Ling, is a Canadian researcher in the field of medicine. Ling's research focuses on drug resistance in cancer. He is best known for his discovery of P-glycoprotein, one of the proteins responsible for multidrug resistance.
Ashutosh K. Tewari is the chairman of urology at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai Hospital in New York City. He is a board certified American urologist, oncologist, and principal investigator. Before moving to the Icahn School of Medicine in 2013, he was the founding director of both the Center for Prostate Cancer at Weill Cornell Medical College and the LeFrak Center for Robotic Surgery at NewYork–Presbyterian Hospital. Dr. Tewari was the Ronald P. Lynch endowed Chair of Urologic Oncology and the hospital's Director of Robotic Prostatectomy, treating patients with prostate, urinary bladder and other urological cancers. He is the current President of the Society for Urologic Robotic Surgeons (SURS) and the Committee Chair of the Prostate Program. Dr. Tewari is a world leading urological surgeon, and has performed over 10,000 robotically assisted procedures using the da Vinci Surgical System. Academically, he is recognized as a world-renowned expert on urologic oncology with over 250 peer reviewed published papers to his credit; he is on such lists as America's Top Doctors, New York Magazine's Best Doctors, and Who's Who in the World. In 2012, he was given the American Urological Association Gold Cystoscope Award for "outstanding contributions to the field of urologic oncology, most notably the treatment of prostate cancer and the development of novel techniques to improve the outcomes of robotic prostatectomy."
Donald Blake Rix, was a Canadian pathologist, philanthropist, community volunteer, and businessman. He was the founder and chair of MDS Metro Laboratory Services, the largest private medical laboratory in Western Canada.
Allen Charles Edward Eaves is the founding Director of the Terry Fox Laboratory for Hematology/Oncology Research, which over a 25-year period (1981–2006) he grew into an internationally recognized centre for the study of leukemia and stem cell research. His own research on chronic myelogenous leukemia (CML) has led the way to a new understanding of the disease. As Head of Hematology at the British Columbia Cancer Agency and the University of British Columbia for 18 years (1985–2003) he engineered the building of one of the first and largest bone marrow transplant programs in Canada. In recognition of his research accomplishments and leadership in moving basic science discoveries in stem cell biology into the clinic, he was elected President of the International Society of Cellular Therapy (1995–1997), Treasurer of the Foundation for the Accreditation of Cellular Therapy (1995–2002) and President of the American Society of Blood and Marrow Transplantation (1999–2000). In 2003 he was awarded the prestigious R. M. Taylor Medal by the Canadian Cancer Society and the National Cancer Institute of Canada. In 2016 he was awarded the Order of British Columbia as well as named Ernst and Young's Entrepreneur Of The Year™ Pacific.
Gordon Walter Semenoff, ,, is a theoretical physicist and professor of physics at the University of British Columbia, Canada. He is known for his research on quantum mechanics, quantum field theory, statistical mechanics and string theory and is particularly famous for his co-invention, together with Antti Niemi, of the parity anomaly in odd-dimensional gauge field theories and for his pioneering work on graphene. He is also well known for development of thermal field theory, the application of index theorems and their generalizations in quantum field theory and string theory, notably with respect to the duality between string theories and gauge field theories.
The Vancouver Prostate Centre (VPC) is a prostate cancer translational research centre located in Vancouver, British Columbia. It is a UBC and VGH Centre of Excellence and a designated national Centre of Excellence for Commercialization and Research. The VPC is hosted by the Vancouver Coastal Health Research Institute and the Department of Urologic Sciences, Faculty of Medicine, University of British Columbia.
Martin T. Schechter is a Canadian epidemiologist recognized for contributions to research about HIV prevention and treatments, addiction research, and Indigenous health research. He is a professor and was the founding director of the School of Population and Public Health in the Faculty of Medicine at the University of British Columbia (UBC). Schechter received his Order of British Columbia in 1994 alongside BC's first Nobel Prize laureate Michael Smith and noted Indigenous artist Bill Reid. In 2022, Schechter was named as a Member of the Order of Canada.
Judith Ann Clements is an Australian academic and educator, specializing in Kallikrein proteases in prostate and ovarian cancers. Clements is the scientific director at the Australian Prostate Cancer Research Centre – Queensland and was head of the Cancer Research Program at the Institute of Health and Biomedical Innovation (IHBI) of Queensland University of Technology at the Translational Research Institute (Australia) from 1997–2014.
Edith Graef McGeer, is an American-Canadian neuroscientist, best known for her work and contributions to the research of prevention and treatment of Alzheimer's and other neurodegenerative diseases. Edith McGeer, along with her husband and co-collaborator, Patrick McGeer, were recognized by the International Scientific Institute as one of the 100 most highly cited researchers in neuroscience. She's a co-founder of Aurin Biotech, which is advancing the drug AUR1107 in pre-clinical trials and FDA approval as an anti-inflammatory treatment for Alzheimer's, muscular degenerative conditions and some cancers.
Kevin M. Slawin is an American physician and the founder of Bellicum Pharmaceuticals and the Vanguard Urologic Institute at Memorial Hermann Medical Group. He was also the Director of Urology at Memorial Hermann Hospital. Slawin specializes in the diagnosis and treatment of urologic cancers and robotic surgery. He is also possesses patents related to the advancement of prostate cancer diagnosis, staging and treatment and to the cellular immunotherapy of cancer.
Julia Levy is a Canadian microbiologist, immunologist, educator and entrepreneur.
Narmada Prasad Gupta is an Indian urologist, medical researcher, writer and the Chairman of Academics and Research Division Urology at the Medanta, the Medicity, New Delhi. He is credited with over 10,000 urological surgical procedures and the highest number of URobotic surgeries in India. He is a former head of department of Urology of the All India Institute of Medical Sciences Delhi and a former president of the Urological Society of India. He received Dr. B. C. Roy Award, the highest Indian award in the medical category, from the Medical Council of India in 2005. The Government of India awarded him the fourth highest civilian honour of the Padma Shri, in 2007, for his contributions to Indian medicine.
Donald Straley Coffey was the Catherine Iola and J. Smith Michael distinguished professor of urology at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine and subsequently professor emeritus. He had a primary appointment in urology and secondary appointments in oncology, pharmacology and pathology.
Dr. Martin Gleave is a Canadian surgeon and cancer researcher who was appointed to the Order of Canada in 2018.
Dr. Alvaro Morales, MD, FRCSC is a Colombian-Canadian urologist, surgeon and Member of the Order of Canada who is noted for his work in the fields of cancer research and testosterone deficiency. He is particularly known for his pioneering work using Bacillus Calmette–Guérin (BCG) to treat bladder cancer, the first proven immunotherapy for cancer. A 2018 article in the Canadian Urological Association Journal said Morales' cancer research "changed the course of urology" and described him as a "living legend."
Amina Zoubeidi is a Canadian research scientist and urologist. She's a scientist at the Vancouver Coastal Health Research Institute and an associate professor in the Department of Urologic Sciences at the University of British Columbia. During her tenure at UBC, Zoubeidi and her research team developed the first drug that targets and blocks BRN2, thus stopping Neuroendocrine prostate cancer (NEPC) tumours and creating a possible treatment for the previously thought incurable disease.
