Martin McMahon

Dr. Martin McMahon was born and raised in Glasgow, Scotland, and attended Glasgow University, graduating with a B.Sc. (Hons) in Biochemistry in 1981. As a Ph.D. student, he studied mechanisms of interferon action with Drs. Ian Kerr and George Stark at the Imperial Cancer Research Fund (ICRF, London) and at Stanford University (Palo Alto, CA), and was awarded a doctorate from King’s College, University of London in 1985. Supported by fellowships from the ICRF (1985-1987) and the American Cancer Society (1988-1990), he received postdoctoral training as a fellow under the mentorship of Nobel prize winner, J. Michael Bishop, at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) investigating the mechanisms of action of oncoprotein kinases such as SRC, ERBB and RAF. In 1991 Dr. McMahon established an independent research group at the DNAX Research Institute in Palo Alto working on the RAF family of protein kinases, which are now known to be mutationally activated in many human cancers. From 1991-1998 Dr. McMahon used a novel experimental approach to dissect the corrupting events that lead normal cells to develop aberrant properties of lethal cancer. In 1998 Dr. McMahon was recruited to the faculty of the UCSF/Helen Diller Family Comprehensive Cancer Center where he served as the Efim Guzik Distinguished Professor of Cancer Biology, Co-Leader of the Experimental Therapeutics Program and Associate Director for Professional Education. During that time, Dr. McMahon’s lab pivoted to the use of genetically-engineered mouse models of melanoma, lung, pancreatic and thyroid cancer. In 2015, Dr. McMahon was recruited to the faculty of Huntsman Cancer Institute, University of Utah where he currently serves as the Cumming-Presidential Chair of Cancer Biology in the Dept. of Dermatology, Senior Director for Preclinical Translation and Co-Leader of the Experimental Therapeutics Program in Huntsman Cancer Institute.