Roy S. Herbst, MD, PhD

Dr. Roy Herbst is internationally recognized as one of the foremost leaders in the development of targeted and immune-based therapies for the treatment of lung cancer. His pioneering clinical studies investigating epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR)-targeted agents in lung and head and neck cancers brought forth a new era in precision medicine and oncology. His translational research spurred the evolution of adaptive clinical trial design toward increasingly more personalized therapeutic approaches, and he was among the first to champion the use of targeted therapies during the earliest stages of disease. His groundbreaking studies have identified critical biomarkers of sensitivity and resistance to immunotherapy, helping to inform treatment decision-making. His work throughout the past three decades has significantly advanced the standard of care for patients with lung cancer, greatly enhancing survival and quality of life beyond what was previously thought to be possible.

After earning B.S. and M.S. degrees from Yale University, Dr. Herbst earned his M.D. at Cornell University Medical College and his Ph.D. in Molecular Cell Biology at The Rockefeller University in New York City, New York. His postgraduate training included an internship and residency in Medicine at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston, Massachusetts. His clinical fellowships in Medicine Oncology and Hematology were completed at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and Brigham and Women’s Hospital, respectively. Subsequently, Dr. Herbst completed an M.S. degree in Clinical Translational Research at Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

Prior to his appointment at Yale, Dr. Herbst was the Barnhart Distinguished Professor and Chief of the Section of Thoracic Medical Oncology in the Department of Thoracic/Head and Neck Medical Oncology, at The University of Texas M.D. Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, Texas. He also served as Professor in the Department of Cancer Biology and Co-Director of the Phase I Clinical Trials Program.

Dr. Herbst traversed to the forefront of personalized medicine and immunotherapy early in his career, identifying key biomarkers and bringing novel targeted and immune-based treatments to patients by serving as principal investigator (PI) for seminal clinical trials testing these agents in advanced-stage lung cancers. This work led to the approval of several important targeted therapies (such as gefitinib, erlotinib, cetuximab, bevacizumab, and axitinib), that revolutionized the field and quickly became the standard of care. This research laid the groundwork for more recent paradigm-shifting studies led by Dr. Herbst investigating targeted agents in earlier stages of disease. One such study, the ADAURA trial, demonstrated the dramatic effect of the third generation EGFR-inhibitor osimertinib as an adjuvant therapy in early-stage resected non-small cell lung cancer, the results of which were published twice in the New England Journal of Medicine, and led to worldwide drug approval and expanded access for patients. He and his colleagues at Yale were also among the first to describe the PD-1/PD-L1 adaptive immune response in early phase trials and to offer clinical trials of the PD-L1 inhibitors atezolizumab and pembrolizumab to lung cancer patients. Dr. Herbst’s leadership in this arena has been formally recognized by his selection to deliver plenary presentations at the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) annual meetings in 2020 and 2023.

Dr. Herbst’s work on umbrella trials, master protocols, and pragmatic trials has further galvanized the field of targeted therapy and cancer drug approvals by the United States (US) Food and Drug Administration (FDA). Nationally, he works closely with public-private partnerships to develop large master protocol clinical studies. He was co-leader of the Biomarker-integrated Approaches of Targeted Therapy for Lung Cancer Elimination-1 (BATTLE-1) and subsequent BATTLE-2 clinical trial programs and was the founding PI of the Lung Master Protocol (Lung-MAP), a position he held for ten years. The Lung-MAP protocol utilizes patient biomarkers to choose treatments that are most likely to provide benefit. He testified on this before the US House of Representatives 21st Century Cures Committee and has helped solidify master protocols as the preferred clinical trial design by the FDA. He is currently the Chair Emeritus and Senior Advisor for the Lung-MAP trial through SWOG. Extending on the success of the Lung-MAP initiative, Dr. Herbst was instrumental in the design and implementation of the Pragmatica-Lung Cancer trial, modernizing and simplifying inclusion criteria to expand access to life-saving treatments to those patients who need it most, often from underserved and rural areas. As a testament to the efficiency of such a trial design, it has accrued 800 patients nationwide in just one year.

Dr. Herbst is a highly respected clinician­ scientist who has been a champion of translational medicine for decades, recently authoring a high-profile review of the 20-year progress in lung cancer for the journal Nature that is widely cited. He has authored or co-authored more than 500 publications, including peer-reviewed journal articles, abstracts, and book chapters. His work has appeared in many prominent journals, such as the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Clinical Cancer Research, Lancet, and the New England Journal of Medicine. Work published in Nature was awarded the 2015 Herbert Pardes Clinical Research Excellence Award by the Clinical Research Forum. His abstracts have been presented at the annual meetings of ASCO, the American Association for Cancer Research (AACR), the International Association for the Study of Lung Cancer (IASLC) World Conference on Lung Cancer (WCLC), and the European Organization for Research and Treatment of Cancer, to name a few.

In 2015, and again in 2020 and 2025, Dr. Herbst’s team at Yale was awarded a Lung Cancer SPORE (P50 grant) by the National Cancer Institute (NCI), which has identified new immunotherapies and mechanisms of sensitivity and resistance to EGFR targeted therapies. In 2017, he successfully helped establish and led the Yale-AstraZeneca Alliance, a strategic partnership that leverages the strengths of academia and industry working together to generate breakthroughs in cancer treatment and care. His work has also been funded by ASCO, AACR, the US Department of Defense, and by an AACR/Stand Up to Cancer Dream Team grant.

Dr. Herbst is a Fellow of ASCO and a member of AACR, where he serves as Chair of the AACR Science Policy and Government Affairs Committee. He has been a major proponent of efforts to promote tobacco control and regulation (including e-cigarettes), authoring multiple policy statements and leading frequent Capitol Hill briefings. He has served on both the IASLC and AACR Board of Directors. He is a Fellow of the American College of Physicians and an elected member of the Association of American Physicians. He has served over ten years in non-consecutive terms as a member of the National Academy of Medicine’s (NAM’s) Cancer Policy Forum, now on his second term, for which he organized and chaired or co-chaired several meetings focused on policy issues in personalized medicine and tobacco control such as, “Policy Issues in the Development of Personalized Medicine in Oncology,” “Reducing Tobacco Related Cancer Incidence and Mortality,” “Optimizing Public-Private Partnerships (PPP) for Clinical Research,” and “Addressing the Impact of Tobacco and Alcohol Use on Cancer-Related Health Outcomes.” Most recently he led the authorship of the manuscript from the 2023 PPP meeting published in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute and is leading the writing team for the most recent workshop.

For his lifetime achievement in scientific contributions to thoracic cancer research, Dr. Herbst was awarded the 2016 Paul A. Bunn, Jr. Scientific Award by the IASLC at their 17th WCLC in Vienna, Austria. He and his team at the Yale Cancer Center were awarded the 2018 Team Science Award from the Association for Clinical and Translational Science for their pioneering work in advancing our understanding of immunotherapy. In 2020, Dr. Herbst was awarded the AACR Distinguished Public Service Award for Exceptional Leadership in Cancer Science Policy. Dr. Herbst is the recipient of the 2022 Giants of Cancer Care^® award for Lung Cancer and was honored by Friends of Cancer Research in 2021 as one of their 25 scientific and advocacy leaders who, through their work and partnership, have been instrumental over the course of the last 25 years in making significant advancements for patients. In 2024, Dr. Herbst became a member of the Board of Directors for Friends of Cancer Research. That year, he was also awarded the Ezra Greenspan Award from the Chemotherapy+ Foundation. In 2025, he was elected into the Connecticut Academy of Science and Engineering.

Beyond Dr. Herbst’s exceptional research accomplishments, he remains a noted educator and teacher. Dr. Herbst is proud to serve as the creator and inaugural director of the Masters in Health Science in Clinical Investigation at the Yale Medical School, which provides training in, and integration of, translational research of all types. He has written chapters for major oncology textbooks (Devita, Frei) and is the Hematology/Oncology Section Editor for the upcoming 28th Edition of Goldman-Cecil Medicine. Since 2021, he has been the Co-Chair/Co-Director of the Robert A. Winn Excellence in Clinical Trials Award Program: Design and Implementation of Clinical Trials Workshop in collaboration with the AACR.

Today, and throughout Dr. Herbst’s storied career, he has remained steadfastly committed to delivering exceptional and compassionate patient care, producing top-notch translational research, and providing enlightening educational experiences to trainees that will prepare them for successful and meaningful careers as healthcare providers and clinical researchers. He has and continues to promote an atmosphere of collegiality and collaboration, building translational bridges between basic and clinical researchers, as well as between academic and industry partners. Dr. Herbst inspires his peers, colleagues, and trainees to strive for excellence in the laboratory, clinic, classroom, and community, and his legacy will make an impact on patients for years to come.