Interrupted in mid-sentence: Judah Folkman

There have been several wonderful public tributes to Judah Folkman. And yet, I cannot escape the heavy sense of his being interrupted in mid-sentence. Just a month ago, I had a follow-up meeting with him and one of my graduate students to discuss her findings that meshed very well with the scientific framework he had built over his life. He was excited, enthusiastic and full of proposals for how he could help her investigate her ideas. As in every meeting, we left energized by his creativity, breadth of vision and generosity. As hundreds of others, we have lost a partner in our most inspiring scientific and collegial conversation. Wearing my librarian hat, I also cannot help but notice that all the accolades only scratch the surface of his accomplishments. He has contributed so many breakthroughs that each on its own would serve as the basis of a very satisfactory and celebrated career. So here, for the record, is a smattering of his achievements:

• Pioneering work on novel materials for anesthesia.
• Surgical treatment of a variety of structural birth defects.
• Ground breaking insights regarding angiogenesis and malignancy.
• New vehicles for the delivery of drugs.
• Novel therapies for glycogen storage disease.
• Early insights into the effects of structure and microenvironments on development and tumorigenesis.
• Champion of the priority of the doctor's obligation to the patient.
• Targeting of non-cancerous diseases for (anti)angiogenic therapy.
• The understanding of how we all live riddled with dormant micromalignancies.
• Recurrent generosity in sharing credit and collaboration.
• Identification of promising antiangiogenic agents.
• Perpetual optimism

We miss you Judah.

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