Nobelist Baltimore Elected to Amgen Board of Directors

Nobel Prize winner David Baltimore has been elected to Amgen’s board of directors.

Baltimore, a biologist, is president of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena.

His accomplishments have come in several areas of expertise, including as a researcher, educator, administrator and public advocate for science and engineering. He received the 1975 Nobel Prize in medicine, along with Caltech alumnus Howard Temin, for work on the mechanism by which cancer-causing RNA viruses are able to establish themselves inside healthy cells.

“Amgen is extremely fortunate to be in a position to benefit from David Baltimore’s extraordinary scientific background and vision,” Gordon Binder, chairman and chief executive of the Thousand Oaks-based biotechnology company, told the Associate Press recently. “David Baltimore is one of the giants in biomedical research in the 20th century, and we are pleased to have his guidance in leading our company into the 21st century.”

Baltimore’s other scientific honors include the 1970 Gustave Stern Award in virology and the 1971 Eli Lilly and Co. Award in microbiology and immunology. He was elected to the National Academy of Sciences in 1974.