Professor Georgina Long AO, BSc PhD MBBS FRACP, is Co-Medical Director of Melanoma Institute Australia, and Chair of Melanoma Medical Oncology and Translational Research at MIA and Royal North Shore Hospital, The University of Sydney. Long leads an extensive clinical trials team and laboratory at MIA, with a focus on targeted therapies and immuno-oncology in melanoma. She is principal investigator on phase I, II and III clinical trials in adjuvant and metastatic melanoma, including trials in patients with active brain metastases. She is the chief investigator on NHMRC funded research into the molecular biology of melanoma, with a particular interest in clinical and tissue biomarker correlates of systemic therapy sensitivity and resistance. In recognition of her ground breaking research, Professor Long has received a number of awards. In a double world first, Long is the first woman and the first Australian to be President of the prestigious US-based Society for Melanoma Research. She has authored over 300 publications in melanoma clinical and translational research, including in the world’s leading scientific high-impact journals such as the New England Journal of Medicine and The Lancet, and has presented at hundreds of international conferences.
Early life and career
Long grew up in a family of six children, with parents working in academia and medicine, and her early life involved living in Europe and the United States. Long was awarded the University Medal in Organic Chemistry. She subsequently completed her PhD in Chemistry in the field of anti-cancer agents and their binding to DNA. She then moved to the USA to take up a Fulbright Postdoctoral Fellowship at Scripps Research Institute, exploring nanotechnology in cancer treatment, before returning to Australia to complete her MBBS. Professor Long became a Fellow of the Australasian College of Physicians in January 2008, specialising in medical oncology. Long has conducted research on many clinical trials in melanoma, including adjuvant and metastatic melanoma. Long has also researched immuno-oncology, which she says is the ‘penicillin moment’ which will be able to turn cancer into ‘treatable conditions’. She has focussed on immuno-oncology in melanoma and targeted therapies. She also developed and is in charge of the treat-excise-analyse-melanoma program, which works on mechanisms of drug sensitivity and resistance.
Awards, honours and recognition
‘Hardly a week goes by without a melanoma patient or their family expressing their gratitude for Professor Long’s ground-breaking research and clinical trials which have afforded them or their loved ones valuable extra time, and in many cases, a new chance at life. 'She is a true role model for all young Australians, particularly young women, who may be working towards a career in science and medicine,’ he said. Two babies have been named after the Melanoma Institute and Long.
2020 — Officer of the Order of Australia for "distinguished service to medicine, particularly to melanoma clinical and translational research, and to professional medical societies".
