Department of Pathology,
University of Edinburgh,
Medical School,

Teviot Place,

EDINBURGH

EH8 9AG

 

2nd February 1979

Professor J. Lederberg,
Executive Head,
Department of Genetics,
School of Medicine,
Stanford University,
California 94305

U.S.A.

Dear Professor Lederberg,

I am sending you a copy of a reprint of the paper which we discussed the
last time I saw you and which formed the basis of the Clowes Lecture I gave at
Buffalo. I have been spending some time working with the honour students here
in Edinburgh since I believe if we are to get anywhere in cancer the new
generation of students should know the problems that arise and the difficulties
in tackling this subject.

As you possibly know I edited a book with Dr. Carter on "The Scientific
Foundations of Oncology" and the editors have asked us to do a short supplement
bringing in about 12 new topics in cancer. In view of our discussion and the need to,
bring in new minds to bear on this difficult problem, I wonder if I could induce S
you to do an article, about 10 thousand words, which I would like to have entitled
"A Molecular Genetist looks at the Cancer Problem", although you are free to choose
your own title. I am absolutely convinced that we can only make an impact by
bringing in new people who need not make cancer research their professional career
but who have the scientific experience and the breadth of vision to look at this
problen. This is the reason why I say in the article I enclose that we should
have a series of departments, within a University, each dealing with one aspect
of a specific cancer. The departmental group should be small, not more than
2-3 scientists with technical support and they should be funded for a limited period
of 3-5 years. In this way we can bring together top class research workers in genetics,
biology, chemistry and physics as well as in the clinical subjects to tackle a cancer
problem in a properly organised scientific manner. This would allow new men and
women to go into the cancer field from their own basic department. If they should
fail to make an impact nothing much is lost since they have still a career ahead of
them. All the time I was Director of the Cancer Institute in London I felt that
good young people may make an early impact but when they run out of ideas there
was no place for them to go.

I hope I can induce you to do this article because I think it is a challenge
which I am sure could excite you. The more T look at the cancer problem the more
I am convinced that further advances in cancer biology will only come in the wake of
advancing technology, and it is men like yourself who are outside the cancer field

who can achieve this or,by such an article, stimulate young scientists of the future
to do so.

T/.e.
Professor Lederberg -2- 26a l9
Stanford University.

I am hoping to visit David Glick in early October next year. We would
like the article to be completed by then and whether or not you do the article
I hope I may see you on that occasion.

Yours sincerely,

Wynton |

Professor Sir Tom Symington

>a

ENC.