Robert Huebner

Robert Joseph Huebner (February 23, 1914 – August 26, 1998), was an American physician and virologist whose research into viruses, their causes and treatment that led to his breakthrough insights into the connections between viruses and cancer, leading to new treatments, as well as his hypothesized oncogene, which was discovered to be a trigger for normal cells turning cancerous.

Early life and education Huebner was born in Cheviot, Ohio, a western suburb of Cincinnati, on February 23, 1914. He attended Xavier College (later Xavier University, where he majored in economics and English literature and took the prerequisites to attend law school. He graduated in June 1942, ranked in the top five of his class of 100.

Huebner document his findings of the new disease in a 1947 paper published in the Journal of the American Medical Association. He was recognized by the American Society of Tropical Medicine for his efforts with the Bailey K. Ashford Award in 1949, which included a $1,000 prize from Eli Lilly and Company that he later used as a down payment for a farm in Frederick, Maryland.

Adenovirus and oncogenes While trying to grow common cold viruses, he and his colleague Dr. Wallace Rowe first tried to use adenoid and tonsil tissue, before using a culture based on tumor cells. From that culture they isolated cytomegalovirus, as well as the first of a large family of adenoviruses. Dr. Robert M. Chanock said the discovery "put him up there with Sabin" (creator of the oral polio vaccine) as one of the "great moments in virology". Based on their observations, Huebner and Rowe hypothesized that these viruses could trigger an unknown gene that would cause cells to grow out of control.

He was also inducted into and participated actively in the United States National Academy of Sciences. He also received the Rockefeller Public Service Award.

Personal life He bought a farm for $4,000 in Frederick, Maryland where he raised his family, using the money he had received as part of an award for his rickettsial research to make the necessary downpayment. His children were each given the task of raising an American Angus bull to help pay for their college education. By the time of Huebner's death in 1998, the farm was operated by three of his children.

Huebner died at age 84 due to pneumonia on August 26, 1998, at the Veterans Administration Medical Center in Coatesville, Pennsylvania, where he had been a resident since 1991. He had been diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease in the early 1980s. He was survived by his second wife, Harriet, as well as by six daughters, two sons and 11 grandchildren. His first marriage had ended in divorce.