The TAT Honorary Award was established in the early 1990s to acknowledge distinguished cancer drug development experts who have devoted a major part of their careers to the discovery and development of better anticancer medicines.
The TAT Honorary Award is presented at the annual ESMO Targeted Anticancer Therapies (TAT) Congress and the Award recipient is invited to give a keynote lecture during the Opening Ceremony.
2024 – Funda Meric-Bernstam, USA
The 2024 TAT Honorary Award was bestowed to Funda Meric-Bernstam, Chair of the Department of Investigational Cancer Therapeutics -- the Phase I Program, Medical Director of the Institute for Personalized Cancer Therapy (IPCT), and The Nellie B. Connally Chair in Breast Cancer at MD Anderson Cancer Center.
Meric-Bernstam is being recognised for her remarkable contributions to precision oncology. A clinical trialist with a focus on decision support for precision oncology, biomarker-driven clinical trials, and antibody-drug conjugates, Meric-Bernstam also has a basic and translational research programme on cell signaling, biomarker discovery and molecular therapeutics with a focus on patient-derived models.
Previous recipients of the TAT Honorary Award
- Susan Bates (2023)
- Lesley K Seymour (2022)
- Ruth Plummer (2021)
- Lillian L. Siu (2020)
- Geoffrey Shapiro (2019)
- Jean-Charles Soria (2018)
- Jedd Wolchok (2017)
- Anthony W. Tolcher (2016)
- Hilary Calvert (2015)
- Patricia LoRusso (2014)
- Jean-Pierre Armand (2013)
- Elizabeth Eisenhauer (2012)
- Giuseppe Giaccone (2011)
- Axel Ullrich (2010)
- Napoleone Ferrara (2009)
- Julian Adams (2008)
- Jaap Verweij (2007)
- Paul Workman (2006)
- Daniel Von Hoff (2005)
- Bob Pinedo (2003)
- John Mendelsohn (2002)
*No meeting took place in 2004
Nomination and selection process
The recipient is nominated by the TAT Congress Scientific Committee based on the following eligibility criteria.
The candidate must:
- be a distinguished cancer drug development expert, who has devoted a major part of their career to the discovery and development of better anticancer medicines
- demonstrate an affiliation to a major academic or cancer research / treatment institution
- have published articles on drug development in highly cited peer-reviewed journals
- be an ESMO member
The candidate must not:
- be a current member of the ESMO Executive Board, the ESMO Council or the ESMO Nomination Committee, nor have served on these committees within the last two years
- be a past recipient of the TAT Honorary Award
- have received any other Award from ESMO within the last five (5) years
- be a Scientific Co-Chair of the ESMO TAT Congress
Members of the Scientific Committee are eligible however they may not nominate themselves. More than one nomination is allowed.
All nominations are evaluated and a final awardee is selected by the Selection Committee: the TAT Congress Scientific Committee Co-Chairs, the ESMO Nomination Committee Chair and the ESMO President.