Thomas J. Kelly

Who is Thomas J. Kelly?

Thomas J. Kelly is an American cancer researcher whose work focuses on the molecular mechanisms of DNA replication. Kelly is director of the Sloan-Kettering Institute, the basic research arm of the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center. He holds the Center's Benno C. Schmidt Chair of Cancer Research.

Before joining Sloan-Kettering in 2002, Kelly was professor and director of the Department of Molecular Biology and Genetics at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine and was the founding director of the Johns Hopkins Institute for Basic Biomedical Sciences.

Kelly pioneered the study of DNA replication in eukaryotic cells by using DNA viruses as model systems. His laboratory developed the first cell-free systems for studying the biochemistry of DNA replication in human cells, enabling the identification and functional characterization of components of the human replication machinery.

In recognition of this work he received the 2004 Alfred P. Sloan, Jr. Prize of the General Motors Cancer Research Foundation and the 2010 Louisa Gross Horwitz Prize of Columbia University.