Leonard I. Zon

Dr. Leonard I. Zon is the Grousbeck Professor of Pediatric Medicine at Harvard Medical School, an Investigator with the Howard Hughes Medical Institute, and Director of the Stem Cell Program at Children's Hospital Boston.

Dr. Zon is internationally recognized for his pioneering research in the new fields of stem cell biology and cancer genetics. His research focuses on two critical avenues of investigation: identifying the genes that direct stem cells to become cancers or to develop into more specialized blood or organ cells, and developing chemical or genetic suppressors to cure cancers and many other devastating diseases.

Dr. Zon's laboratory uses the zebrafish to understand vertebrate blood development. Zebrafish blood formation is similar to blood formation in people, and some mutant zebrafish have disorders that mirror human conditions. Dr. Zon also uses zebrafish to study cancer.

He received a B.S. in chemistry and natural sciences from Muhlenberg College and an M.D. from Jefferson Medical College. He subsequently did an internal medicine residency at New England Deaconess Hospital and a fellowship in medical oncology at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute.

Dr. Zon is President of the International Society for Stem Cell Research, President of the American Society for Clinical Investigation, Head of the external investigators of the Zebrafish Genome Institution and Chairman of the Harvard Stem Cell Institutes Executive Committee.