Judah Folkman, 74, pioneering cancer researcher

BOSTON - Judah Folkman, 74, a groundbreaking researcher who worked to cut off cancer from its blood supply, curing the disease in mice and giving humans hope for a cure, died Monday of a heart attack.

Dr. Folkman was director of the vascular biology program at Children's Hospital Boston.

"I think he was one of the most important investigators of our time," said Dr. David Nathan, president emeritus of the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute in Boston.

Dr. Folkman championed the idea that cancer needs a growing network of blood vessels to survive and that blocking that process, called angiogenesis, will stop or even eliminate tumors. He was able to cure mice of the disease, and his work opened the door to a new line of treatment that has slowed the growth of cancer in humans.

Angiogenesis inhibitors also have shown success in treating other diseases, including arthritis and diseases of the eye, heart and skin.

His research has led to 10 cancer drugs currently on the market that are helping more than 1.2 million patients worldwide, including Avastin and Thalomid. Dozens of other drugs based on his ideas are being developed.

Dr. Folkman's research began in the 1960s. He carried on his work in relative anonymity until a May 1998 story in the New York Times, in which Dr. James Watson, the Nobel laureate and codiscoverer of the shape of DNA, was quoted as saying: "Judah is going to cure cancer in two years."

"That set off a fuss, and many of his colleagues were all upset because it was too radical an idea," said Robert Cooke, author of a book about Dr. Folkman. "They said it can't be all that simple."

The scientist played down Watson's proclamation. "I don't think angiogenesis inhibitors will be the cure for cancer," he wrote in Scientific American in 1998. "But I do think that they will make cancer more survivable and controllable, especially in conjunction with radiation, chemotherapy and other treatments."

Dr. Folkman's peers remembered him as a doctor with an insatiable thirst for knowledge who never forgot that patients came first. He spent hours a day taking telephone calls from patients and researchers all over the world.

"Not only was he a brilliant scientist," said Dr. Jim Mandell, president and CEO of Children's Hospital Boston. "He's always been the most amazingly kind and generous man."

Dr. Folkman earned a medical degree in 1957 from Harvard Medical School, where he helped design one of the first implantable heart pacemakers. He later helped develop devices placed under the skin for time-release drugs.

He is survived by his wife, Paula, and two daughters.