Professor Alan Ashworth is Chief Executive of the The Institute of Cancer Research (ICR), London

He´s the Leader of the Gene Function Team at the Breakthrough Breast Cancer Research Centre

Professor Alan Ashworth is a talented, visionary and respected world leader in the field of breast cancer research and personalized cancer medicine. His laboratory focuses upon using genetic principles to understand cancer biology and then using this information to develop novel and personalized therapeutic strategies for cancer treatment.

Professor Ashworth holds a BSc in Chemistry and Biochemistry from Imperial College, London and completed his PhD in Biochemistry at University College London. He has worked at the Chester Beatty Laboratories at the ICR since 1986. Two years later, he was appointed Professor of Molecular Biology at the ICR, becoming Head of Section of Gene Function and Regulation.

In August 1999 he was appointed the first Director of the Breakthrough Breast Cancer Research Centre. This Centre has more than 120 scientists and researchers working on aspects of the disease ranging from basic molecular and cellular biology through to translational research and clinical trials. In January 2011 he took up the position of Chief Executive of the ICR.

One of Professor Ashworth´s major contributions to cancer research has been on genes involved in cancer risk. He was a key part of the team that discovered the BRCA2 gene in 1995. Ten years later, Professor Ashworth identified a way to exploit genetic weaknesses in cancer cells including mutated BRCA2, leading to a new therapeutic strategy for cancer treatment in the form of the synthetic lethality using PARP inhibitors

Professor Ashworth’s contributions to mammalian genetics and identification and study of inherited breast cancer susceptibility genes saw him elected as a Fellow of the Royal Society in May 2008.

As an elected member of EMBO (European Molecular Biology Organisation) and the Academy of Medical Sciences, Professor Ashworth has played a big part in making the Breakthrough Research Centre the world class facility that it is today. He has led research into new treatments for hereditary breast cancer which are now in clinical trials.