José was born in Barcelona in 1959 and received his medical degree from Universidad Autónoma de Barcelona in 1983. He started his residency at Vall d’Hebron Hospital, but before completing it, moved to the United States to work at Kings County Hospital in Brooklyn, New York. Despite his clinical duties, José also conducted laboratory work at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center (MSKCC), testing the activity of new antibodies that target the growth-factor receptors EGFR and HER2—precursors of the now-approved targeted therapies cetuximab and trastuzumab. In 1991 he moved to MSKCC full time, to work under the mentorship of John Mendelsohn and Larry Norton, with whom he contributed to the development of cetuximab, the monoclonal antibody to EGFR that is currently approved for both head and neck cancer and colorectal cancer, and trastuzumab, the monoclonal antibody to HER2 that revolutionized the management of HER2-positive breast cancer.
In 1996, José made the bold decision to return to Spain and serve as Chief of Oncology of Vall d’Hebron Hospital in Barcelona, at the time an internationally little-known public hospital that lacked a strong oncology research track. Beyond his skills as a clinician scientist, a real gift José had was his vision. Looking far into the future, he worked strenuously to attract talent and hire the best biomedical professionals to create not only a powerhouse of oncology research but also a new school of biomedical thinking: science-based precision medicine. The legacy of this work, visible on the hills overlooking the hospital, is the Vall d’Hebron Institute of Oncology, now led by Josep Tabernero, José’s closest collaborator at the time.
