Notable Alums

Avery

Specialty: Hematology

Graduation Year: 1946

Avery Sandberg

Avery Sandberg, M.D. ’46, is a retired research professor of medicine and chief of the Genetics and Endocrinology Department at Roswell Park Memorial Cancer Institute in Buffalo, New York. He was most recently affiliated with St. Joseph’s Hospital and Medical Center in Phoenix, Ariz. His research pioneered the understanding of the link between cancer and chromosomes.

Dr. Sandberg wrote or co-wrote more than 470 scientific articles, papers and reviews, including the 1961 first report of a man with a 47,XYY karotype, or extra Y chromosome.

He wrote or co-wrote the books “The Chromosomes in Human Cancer and Leukemia,” “Sister chromatid exchange,” “The Genetics and Molecular Biology of Neural Tumors and The Genetics and Molecular Biology of Neural Tumors,” and “The Cytogenetics of Bone and Soft Tissue Tumors.” He also edited “Cytogenetics of the Mammalian X Chromosome, Parts A and B” and “The Y Chromosome, Parts A and B.” He was editor-in-chief of the journals Cancer Genetics and Cytogenetics, and The Prostate.

In 1983, he received WSU School of Medicine Alumni Association’s Distinguished Alumni Award.