Dr Robert Hawkins

After a degree in mathematics from Trinity College, Cambridge and studying Medicine at Cambridge and University College London, he undertook clinical training in Medical Oncology at the Royal Marsden Hospital and Addenbrookes Hospital. He subsequently undertook a PhD in Cambridge where he was an MRC Research Fellow with Sir Greg Winter and Dr Cesar Milstein at the MRC laboratory of Molecular Biology. His PhD was in antibody engineering – the methods he developed for affinity selection/maturation were important in the development of Cambridge Antibody Technology and of Humira (the world’s second largest selling drug). As Cancer Research UK Senior Clinical Fellow, he developed translational research interests in antibody-based gene therapy and adoptive cell therapy. In 1998 he moved to the Christie Hospital to become Professor and Director of Medical Oncology. Clinically, Professor Hawkins focused on development of immunotherapies for kidney and other cancers and led kidney cancer trials and also a range of early phase clinical trials of biological agents including vaccines, antibodies and cellular therapy. He has been a key investigator for several trial leading to the licensing of drugs for the treatment of metastatic kidney cancer. He managed a large practice which was a national referral centre for high dose interleukin-2 treatment and has published widely on kidney cancer therapy in general In 2019 he retired from NHS practice but continues to see patients at the Christie Clinic. He also led a group undertaking translational research into immunotherapy of cancer with a focus on adoptive cell therapy. In addition, to pre-clinical research he has developed a GMP cell therapy unit which has subsequently developed into an independent spinout company (Immetacyte Ltd) focussed on the development of adoptive cell therapy. He has also been the coordinator of several major European Union consortia in this field (the pre-clinical cell therapy ATTACK project and a cell therapy training network (ATTRACT) and an FP7 cell therapy clinical trials consortium (ATTACK) – he has undertaken a range of cell therapy trials (T-reg depletion, CEA and CD19 CAR-T, NY-ESO1 TCR and TIL. He has published widely in scientific and clinical journals (H-Index = 70) and is an inventor / co-inventor on several antibody and cell therapy related patents.

Immunotherapy of cancer - largely focussed treatment of kidney cancer and the development of adoptive cell therapy.