Bert O'Malley, M.D., receives National Medal of Science
By Ruth SoRelle, M.P.H.
The medal is engraved:
Bert W. O'Malley
For his pioneering work on the molecular mechanisms of steroid hormone action and hormone receptors and coactivators, which has had a profound impact on our knowledge of steroid hormones in normal development and in diseases, including cancer."
Academic research is full of distractions.
There are committees and conferences and administrative detail. You can travel and you can consult.
In the end, however, it's how you do that science.
Bert O'Malley, M.D., chair of Baylor College of Medicine's department of molecular and cellular biology, has kept his focus on the science, remaining in the laboratory while marshalling a top basic science department to greater efforts. On Sept. 29, 2008, the United States recognized that single-mindedness when President George W. Bush awarded him the National Medical of Science, along with seven other top researchers.
Thrilling honor
Winning the highest scientific honor in the nation is a thrill, said O'Malley. He is only the fifth scientific star in Texas to receive the honor, which recognizes pioneering scientific research in a range of fields, including biology, physics, mathematics, engineering and the social and behavioral sciences. Only the late Michael E. DeBakey, M.D. at BCM had received the award previously.
"It is a great surprise. It is certainly appreciated and is humbling," said O'Malley, who is often credited with birthing the field of molecular endocrinology. His fascination with hormones and their role in the cell began in medical school.
"Since I was a young medical student, I always was fascinated with the cell and how it works," he said. "I quickly realized that a cell (and the body) only springs into action when hormones stimulate the signaling and synthetic pathways inherent to the cells. My main interest then became 'how does the cell respond to its environmental signals?'"
A life's quest
Understanding the normal regulatory pathways and how they work in the cell is crucial because then it is easier to fix what goes wrong, causing disease, he said. That research became a lifelong quest for O'Malley. Each experiment generated new questions that led to new information that again raised new questions.
"As a naïve young scientist, I thought I might find the answer as to how steroid hormones (estrogen, androgen, cortisol, etc.) work in about five years," he said. "Now it has been more than 45 years, and I still don't understand all the details."
Important findings
However, the details he has worked out has helped in unraveling the roles of co-activators through which steroid receptors work to regulate genes. Those findings have led to new understandings of diseases such as cancer, inflammatory disorders, reproductive and metabolic diseases. It also helped scientists understand how many drugs such as tamoxifen, used in the treatment of breast cancer, work.
O'Malley said one of the delights of winning the award is how excited it has made his friends, colleagues and trainees and his family – wife Sally and four children.
"Finally, I should say that all of the credit belongs equally to the trainees and colleagues who have performed the work emanating from my ideas – and most of all, they must be shared by my loving family for their devotion and support of my life's passion for science."
