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The scientific assessor to the Parc Científic de Barcelona, Joan Massagué, receives the 2004 Prince of Asturias Research Prize

By 19 de November de 2004November 18th, 2020No Comments
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 19.11.2004

The scientific assessor to the Parc Científic de Barcelona, Joan Massagué, receives the 2004 Prince of Asturias Research Prize

The researcher Joan Massagué, president of the International Scientific Committee of the Parc Científic de Barcelona (PCB, Barcelona Science Park) and the Institute of Biomedical research of the same (IRB-PCB), has been awarded the 2003 Prince of Asturias Prize for Scientific and Technical Research for "leading a fundamental part of the international research on cancer". This week, coinciding with this award, the PCB and the publishing house Península, part of the Grup62, have presented the book «Biografía del Cáncer. La aventura de Joan Massagué», written by the journalist Xavier Pujol Gebellí.


On Friday 22nd October, Joan Massagué, director of the Cancer Biology and Genetics Programme at the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center , who has been living in the USA since 1979, received the 2004 Prince of Asturias Award for Scientfic and Technical Research. The Catalan scientist has been granted this prize in recognition of his valuable contribution to elucidating the basic biochemical processes that occur in cell cycle and their involvement in cancer. Specifically, Joan Massagué is renowned for his findings on on the role of the TGF-beta hormone in slowing down cell division and, recently, for his contributions to knowledge on metastasis, the cause of most deaths from cancer.

The book by Xavier Pujol Gebellí relates the personal and professional trajectory of Joan Massagué and describes the way in which a young and talented scientist encountered the opportunities in the USA to become an internationally renowned scientist in biomedicine. Joan Massagué is one of the 50 most cited authors in all fields of science in the last twenty years. For the last 15 years he has been a member of the select and restricted group of scientists at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute and is a full member of the prestigious National Academy of Science of the USA. Since 2000, he has directed the Cancer Biology and Genetics Programme at the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer in New York, one of the most famous oncological centres in the world.