UAB Comprehensive Cancer Center Magazine Winter 2018 | Page 18

research update
“I got interested
in UAB because
it was clear that
the interaction
of faculty across
departments
wasn’t just
something that
was talked about,
but something
that built the
institution
and moved it
forward.”
Alber t LoBuglio, M.D.
16
U A B
Albert LoBuglio and M.B. Khazaeli. Photo courtesy UAB Archives.
Seeking the magic bullet
As basic scientists were developing monoclonal
antibody (Mab) technology in the late 1970s and
early 1980s in their labs, clinicians were searching
for ways to bring Mabs to patients.
Albert LoBuglio, M.D., who would become the
UAB Cancer Center’s second director in 1983, was
then director of the Division of Hematology and
Oncology and the Simpson Memorial Research
Center at the University of Michigan Medical
Center.
Albert LoBuglio: “In the early 1980s, a
number of institutions had figured out how to
use monoclonal antibodies in research. When I
arrived at the University of Michigan there was
a young basic scientist there in the pathology
department named M.B. Khazaeli, who was
making monoclonal antibodies for laboratory
testing. We met and started to do joint research.
Since I had all this antibody background it was
sort of a natural transition to monoclonals. We
used them to produce novel laboratory tests and
animal models of cancer.”
C O M P R E H E N S I V E
C A N C E R
C E N T E R
LoBuglio’s excitement about Mabs caught the
attention of Mansoor Saleh, M.D., a young
resident at the Henry Ford Hospital in Detroit.
Mansoor Saleh: “Dr. LoBuglio came to
Henry Ford to give grand rounds, and he used
the term ‘magic bullet’ — a targeted antibody
therapy that would only kill cancer cells. I
thought that was exactly what I wanted to
do, so I applied to the fellowship program at
Michigan and was accepted. Then I found out
he had taken the job at UAB, and I said, ‘OK,
I’ll go to Alabama instead.’”
LoBuglio: “I got interested in UAB because it
was clear that the interaction of faculty across
departments wasn’t just something that was
talked about, but something that built the
institution and moved it forward. When we
came here, it seemed like an ideal time to put
a team together specifically for monoclonal
antibody studies.”