Anyone graduating from medical school in 1966 had first to fulfill military service before launching a career. Fiercely opposed to the Vietnam War, I sought to avoid it through an assignment to the Public Health Service.

Science can improve lives in ways that are elegant in design and moving in practice.

In general, all cancers have been traditionally characterized by the way they appear under the microscope and the organs in which they arise.

A cancer is not simply a lung cancer. It doesn't simply have a certain kind of appearance under the microscope or a certain behavior, but it also has a set of changes in the genes or in the molecules that modify gene behavior that allows us to categorize cancers in ways that is very useful in thinking about new ways to control cancer by prevention and treatment.

Tobacco, UV rays, viruses, heredity, and age are the main causes of cancer.

My ideal summer day was reading on the porch.

I keep encouraging the pharmaceutical companies to put more money into R&D.