Funmi Olopade

A practicing medical oncologist, she is the Walter L Palmer Distinguished Service professor of medicine and director of the Center for Clinical Cancer Genetics at the University of Chicago Medical Center. As a clinician scientist, Dr. Olopade’s research is focused on advancing novel strategies to prevent and treat cancer based on an understanding of the altered genetic pathways in individual patients.

Dr. Olopade has received numerous honors and awards, including honorary degrees from Bowdoin, Princeton, North Central, and Dominican universities. She is also a recipient of the Doris Duke Distinguished Clinical Scientist and Exceptional Mentor Award, an American Cancer Society Clinical Research Professorship, a MacArthur Foundation Fellowship, a Franklin Roosevelt Freedom from Want Award, The Gregory Mendel Medal, and Officer of the Order of the Niger Award.

Dr. Olopade is an elected member of the National Academy of Medicine, American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and the American Philosophical Society. She currently serves on the board of directors for the MacArthur Foundation, the Lyric Opera of Chicago; and is a Scientific Board Advisor for Tempus and Cancer IQ. Dr. Olopade received her bachelor’s and medical degree from the University of Ibadan in her native country Nigeria.