Since 1996, Prof. Robert C. Gallo, M.D. has been Director of the Institute of Human Virology, a center of the University of Maryland Biotechnology Institute, and Professor of Medicine and Microbiology in the School of Medicine, University of Maryland in Baltimore. Before that he spent 30 years at the National Cancer Institute (NCI) of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) in Bethesda, mostly as head of the NCI Laboratory of Tumor Cell Biology.

Dr. Gallo’s career-long interest has followed one theme: the study of the basic biology of human blood cells, their normal and abnormal growth, and the causes of abnormal growth whether excessive, e.g. leukemias, or insufficient, e.g. immune deficiencies.

The model and the doctor. HIV-positive top-model Rebekka Armstrong delivered a stirring laudation for Dr. Gallo’s accomplishments.

In 1980 Dr. Gallo and his co-workers opened the field of human retroviruses when they discovered the first human retrovirus (HTLV-1) and with others showed it was a cause of a particular form of human leukemia. (This was the first, and to date, the only known human leukemia virus and one of the few known viruses shown to cause a human cancer). A year later he and his group discovered the second known human retrovirus (HTLV-2). HTLV-2 has not yet been shown to cause disease. Dr. Gallo and his colleagues also independently discovered HIV (the 3rd known human retrovirus). In a series of publications in 1984 they also provided the first results to show that HIV was the cause of AIDS. They also developed the life-saving HIV blood test, which was the first practical advance in AIDS research.