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John Hancock, MA, MB, BChir, PhD, ScD

Dr. John F. Hancock

Senior Vice President, Research Strategy and Innovation, UTHealth Houston
Executive Dean, McGovern Medical School at UTHealth Houston
Executive Director, The Brown Foundation Institute of Molecular Medicine at McGovern Medical School

Email: John.F.Hancock@uth.tmc.edu

John Hancock, MA, MB, BChir, PhD, ScD, was named executive dean of McGovern Medical School at UTHealth Houston in September 2022. He also is executive director of The Brown Foundation Institute of Molecular Medicine for the Prevention of Human Diseases at McGovern Medical School (IMM) and senior vice president for research strategy and innovation at UTHealth Houston. Additionally, he serves on faculty at MD Anderson Cancer Center UTHealth Houston Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences.

Hancock joined the McGovern Medical School faculty in 2008 as chair of the Department of Integrative Biology and Pharmacology, which is ranked sixth nationally in NIH funding, according to the Blue Ridge Institute. In 2012, Hancock became vice dean of research and executive director of the IMM.

Hancock’s research focus involves the basic mechanism of mammalian cell signaling, specifically RAS proteins. Recent novel insights from his research programs have been translated into drug discovery programs aimed at fighting cancer. A prolific publisher, his work has been cited nearly 30,000 times, and he has served on numerous NIH study sections.

He is a fellow of the Royal Australian College of Physicians and a member of The Royal College of Physicians (U.K.). Prior to joining UTHealth Houston, he served as a research director at Onyx Pharmaceuticals in California and was deputy director of the Institute for Molecular Bioscience, University of Queensland, Australia. He also was on the faculty of the University of Queensland.

Hancock holds the H. Wayne Hightower Distinguished Professorship in the Medical Sciences and the John S. Dunn Distinguished University Chair in Physiology and Medicine, and has been the recipient of a STARs award for outstanding faculty at a University of Texas System health institution.

A graduate of the University of Cambridge, he trained in internal medicine and hematology/oncology before earning his doctorate at the Institute of Cancer Research, London.

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