| Suzanne Topalian | |
| Birth Place: | Alpine, New Jersey |
| Alma Mater: | BA, English, Wellesley College MD, 1979, Tufts University School of Medicine |
| Awards: | Nature's 10 (2014) |
| Workplaces: | Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine National Cancer Institute |
Suzanne Louise Topalian (born 1954) is an American surgical oncologist. She is the Bloomberg-Kimmel Professor of Cancer Immunotherapy in the Bloomberg-Kimmel Institute for Cancer Immunotherapy at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. In this role, she studies human anti-tumor immunity.
Topalian was born to father Malcolm F. Topalian in Alpine, New Jersey. Her father was the president of the Topalian Trading Company, a rug concern in New York.[1] She played piano growing up and won first prize in a Tri-State competition.[2] Upon graduating from high school, Topalian received her undergraduate degree from Wellesley College and her medical degree from Tufts University School of Medicine in 1979.[3] She then completed her residency in general surgery at the Thomas Jefferson University Hospital in Philadelphia under the guidance of Surgical Residency Director Herbert Cohn.[4] Following this, she held two fellowships at both the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia and National Cancer Institute (NCI).[3]
Upon completing her fellowship at NCI in 1989, Topalian intended to leave but was persuaded to stay and work with tumor immunologist Steven Rosenberg.[5] [4] She remained at the institute's Surgery Branch for 21 years before joining the faculty at Johns Hopkins University to lead the Melanoma Program in the Sidney Kimmel Comprehensive Cancer Center.[3] Her work with the program led to a landmark publication in 2012 showing that nivolumab (Opdivo) produced dramatic responses in people with advanced melanoma and in those with lung cancer.[6] [7] Following this study, Topalian also found that the drug Opdivo caused some patients to have lasting responses that continued even after stopping the drug.[8] She was later named one of Nature's 10 in 2014 for her ability to establish immunotherapy as an important treatment modality in cancer.[5]
As the Director of the Melanoma Program, Topalian researches modulating immune checkpoints such as PD-1 and PD-L1 in cancer therapy, and discovering biomarkers predicting clinical outcomes following treatment.[3] In 2015, she was the recipient of the David Karnofsky Memorial Award for her contributions to the research of cancer.[9] The following year, Topalian returned to her original research on Opdivo and found that over one-third of advanced melanoma patients were still alive five years after starting therapy with the cancer drug.[8] While continuing to study human anti-tumor immunity, Topalian was elected to the American Association of Physicians[10] and named the co-recipient of the Taubman Prize Awarded for Ground-Breaking Work in Cancer Immunotherapy.[11] In October 2017, Topalian was elected to the National Academy of Medicine as someone who has "made major contributions to the advancement of the medical sciences, health care and public health."[12]
In 2018, Topalian was appointed the Bloomberg-Kimmel Professor of Cancer Immunotherapy in the Bloomberg-Kimmel Institute for Cancer Immunotherapy.[13] She was also elected to serve on Dragonfly Therapeutics, Inc.'s Scientific Advisory Board.[14]
Topalian married Drew Pardoll in 1993.[1]