David Uehling

Director, Drug Discovery

David Uehling picture

David Uehling

Ontario Institute for Cancer Research

Director, Drug Discovery

Following completion of his PhD in synthetic organic chemistry at the University of California, Berkeley with Clayton Heathcock, David did a post-doc with Stuart Schreiber at Yale and Harvard University. In 1989-2008, he worked at GlaxoSmithKline in cardiovascular, diabetes and oncology research. During this time, David played a key role in the discovery of clinical drugs including lurtotecan for colon cancer, solabegron for diabetes, and, most recently, dabrafenib, which is now an FDA-approved drug for treatment of metastatic melanoma. In 2009, David was recruited to the newly formed Medicinal Chemistry platform within the Ontario Institute for Cancer Research (OICR). Because of the attractiveness of helping drive basic discoveries made in the Toronto academic community into new therapies for cancer patients, David took the opportunity to move from North Carolina to Toronto. Since joining OICR, he has been involved with early-stage projects arising from the Ontario academic community to help further the Institute’s mission of translating academic discoveries into novel medicines for the treatment of cancer. One such project led to a drug for the treatment of acute myelogenous leukemia, which is projected to enter the clinic 2019. In addition to his role on OICR projects, one of the key roles David plays is to help support members of the Toronto academic community to help validate their biological targets. Over the past few years, he has worked with dozens of collaborators in Toronto and across Ontario. David has also been involved with the training of young scientists who joined the Drug Discovery Team at OICR to help learn the science of cancer drug discovery.