Johannes Vieweg, M.D. Named to Wayne and Marti Huizenga Eminent Scholar Chair in Urological Research.
Dr. Johannes Vieweg, professor and founding chair of the department of
urology, has been named to the Wayne and Marti Huizenga Eminent Scholar
Chair in Urologic Research. This distinguished appointment recognizes Dr.
Vieweg's outstanding contributions to the three missions in the field of
urology, the amazing trajectory of his new department, and the innovations
he has made in the development of biological therapies for prostate cancer.
Dr. Vieweg will be the cornerstone of the UF, Shands, and Moffitt program in
genitourinary malignancies.
Dr. Vieweg received his medical degree from the University of Munich in Germany and began his residency training in the department of urology at the University of Ulm in Germany. After coming to the United State, he completed three years of postdoctoral training at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in New York before finishing his urology training at Duke. He came to UF in 2006, and is viewed as an international authority in urologic oncology.
Much of Dr. Vieweg's research has focused on the development and early clinical testing of new immunotherapies and other novel treatments for cancers of the genitourinary tract, including prostate cancer. Recently he led the first study of a new vaccine that uses the patients' own dendritic cells, a type of white blood cell, to slow prostate cancer growth by priming the immune system to recognize malignant cells and then target them for destruction, without toxic side effects. The vaccine, currently undergoing additional testing, is intended for patients who have not responded to standard treatments. He has also led the development of a new Good Manufacturing Practices facility that provides engineered cells and small molecules required for vaccine-based clinical trials involving patients with cancer and certain infectious diseases, and produces new stem cell-based therapies. He has also led the development of a minimally invasive cancer program that could help treat many patients on an outpatient basis; the approach capitalizes on new robotic technology. Dr. Vieweg's projects also involve the development and testing of "targeted therapeutics" as well as improved prediction models for therapeutic success, an effort to better identify which patients will respond to treatment and which will be unresponsive.
