General Biology Seminar
Jeffrey V. Ravetch, M.D., Ph.D. is currently the Theresa and Eugene Lang Professor at the Rockefeller University and Head of the Leonard Wagner Laboratory of Molecular Genetics and Immunology.
Dr. Ravetch, a native of New York City, received his undergraduate training in molecular biophysics and biochemistry at Yale University, earning his B.S. degree in 1973, where he pursued research studies with Donald M. Crothers on the thermodynamic and kinetic properties of synthetic oligoribonucleotides. He continued his training at the Rockefeller University – Cornell Medical School MD/Ph.D program, earning his doctorate in 1978 in genetics with Norton Zinder and Peter Model by investigating the genetic basis for the regulation of viral replication and gene expression for the single stranded DNA bacteriophage f1. In 1979 he earned his M.D. from Cornell University Medical School. Following postdoctoral studies at the NIH with Phil Leder where he identified and characterized the genes for the human IgM antibody and the DNA elements involved in switch recombination, in 1982 Dr. Ravetch joined the faculty of Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center and Cornell Medical College. His laboratory cloned the first genes for Fc receptors, identified the SHIP inhibitory receptor signaling pathway and contributed significantly to understanding the mechanisms of antibody mediated effector responses, establishing the FcR pathways as fundamental components of the immune response. In addition to his studies on antibody receptors, Dr. Ravetch has made fundamental contributions to the genetics of the malaria parasite and with the identification of the first chemokine, IP-10, established this class of molecules as novel mediators of inflammation. He returned to The Rockefeller University in 1996 to establish the Laboratory of Molecular Genetics and Immunology.
He has published over 155 papers in the highest profile journals in molecular biology, immunology and molecular parasitology.
Dr. Ravetch has received numerous awards for his research including the Burroughs-Wellcome Scholar Award, the Pew Scholar Award, the Boyer Award, the Kunkel Lecturer, the Ecker Lecturer, the NIH Merit Award, the Lee C. Howley, Sr. Prize for arthritis research, the AAI-Huang Foundation Meritorious Career Award, the William B. Coley Award for Distinguished Research in Basic and Tumor Immunology, and the Gairdner Award. In 2006, he was elected to the National Academy of Sciences; in 2007, to the Institute of Medicine of the National Academies; in 2008, to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and the American Association for the Advancement of Science.
He has contributed extensively to the scientific community by serving as a member of the Scientific Advisory Boards of the Cancer Research Institute, the Irvington Institute for Medical Research and the Damon Runyon Foundation. He has been active in biotechnology for the last decade, having served as a consultant or member of the Scientific Advisory Boards of Millennium Pharmaceuticals, Exelexis Pharmaceuticals, Regeneron Pharmaceuticals, Medimmune, Genentech and Novartis. He founded MacroGenics in 2000 with Leroy Hood, Alan Aderem and Reudi Aebersold and Virdante Pharmaceuticals in 2007.