Robert A. Newman is an American pharmacologist specializing in molecular biology, drug development, and immunology.
He is professor emeritus, professor of experimental therapeutics, founder and co-director of the Center for Pharmaceutical Development of the MD Anderson Cancer Center at the University of Texas.
Background
After earning his M.S. and Ph.D. in pharmacology and toxicology from the University of Connecticut, Newman worked as a postdoctoral fellow in the biochemistry department at the University of Vermont and the Medical School of the University of Georgia. He served as a faculty member at the University of Vermont Medical School for seven years and then spent a sabbatical year at Stanford University performing research on immune targeted therapy. In 1984 he was appointed as chief of the Section of Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics at the University of Texas M.D. Anderson Cancer, where he then spent 24 years at this institution in Houston, Texas. There he held the D. B. Lane Distinguished Professorship Chair. At MDACC he served as the founder and co-director of the Pharmaceutical Development Center and the institution's Analytical Center.[1]
In 1988, Newman began studies of the anticancer potential of extracts and components of Nerium oleander research that was initially begun by Turkish Doctor H. Ziya Ozel.[2]
Works
Newman has published over 320 articles dealing with the preclinical and clinical pharmacology, toxicology, and development of therapies for the prevention and treatment of malignant diseases. His research and publications have detailed the novel value of oleandrin and oleander extracts in prevention of stroke mediated ischemic injury to brain tissue and more recently against key viruses (e.g. Ebola, HTLV-1, HIV).[3]
