Bert Vogelstein was born in Baltimore (USA) in 1949. He is Professor at the Faculty of Medicine Johns Hopkins University and research fellow at the Howard Hughes Medical Centre. As a result of his work to identify and characterise gene changes leading to colon cancer, he is now considered one of the benchmark figures in oncological research. He discovered the APC gene - which controls cell growth in the colon - and has also made major contributions to our understanding of the role of the p53 gene in the tumour-producing process, and of other p53-linked genes such as PUMA and PRL-3. The Medal of Honour of the American Cancer Society (1992), the Pezcoller Foundation Award (1993), the G.H.A. Clowes Memorial, awarded by the American Association of Cancer Research and the acknowledgements of a number of universities around the world figure amongst Bert Vogelstein's distinctions. He is also a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.