Frank M. Torti, MD, MPH, FACP passed away on October 14, 2024 from complications of leukemia. He was 77 years old.
Dr. Torti was born in Northvale New Jersey and spent his childhood in a home that his grandparents built after immigrating from Italy. He was the first in his family to attend college. He received BA and MA degrees from Johns Hopkins University, an MD from Harvard Medical School, and an MPH from the Harvard School of Public Health. Following an internship and fellowship in medical oncology, he joined the faculty at Stanford Medical School, and subsequently moved to Wake Forest University as Director of their Comprehensive Cancer Center. He founded the Cancer Biology Training Consortium (CABTRAC), a national society of cancer biology chairs and program directors, and served as a member of the Advisory Committee to the Congressional Taskforce on Research and Innovation, which first conceptualized the “cancer moonshot.” In 2009 he was appointed as the first Chief Scientist and Acting Commissioner of the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and later served as Executive Vice President and Dean of the University of Connecticut School of Medicine and Health Center.
Dr. Torti’s clinical interests focused on urologic oncology, and he designed and executed clinical trials that became standards of care in genitourinary oncology worldwide. He recently published a book, Surviving Your Doctor, distilled from his long experience as a physician and designed to help patients navigate serious illnesses, including cancer.
His laboratory research interests centered on the complex relationships between iron, inflammation, oxidative stress and cancer. In 1988, his laboratory discovered that the gene encoding the H subunit of ferritin was transcriptionally induced by tumor necrosis factor (TNF). This work revealed for the first time that ferritin was subject to transcriptional as well as translational control and was the springboard for his continuing investigations into molecular mechanisms of regulation of iron homeostasis, particularly the regulation of iron-dependent genes and proteins by oxidants, cytokines, and oncogenes. His research interests were shared with his wife Suzy Torti, with whom he worked throughout his career. Notable discoveries included molecular mechanisms of the transcriptional regulation of ferritin by oncogenes, oxidants, tumor suppressors and chemopreventive agents; identification of ferroportin and other genes of iron homeostasis as prognostic indicators in cancer; ferritin-mediated regulation of endothelial cell function and angiogenesis through interaction with kininogen; and roles for IRP2 and hepcidin in the regulation of tumor growth. His research was continuously funded by the NIH for over 35 years.
Frank Torti was a kind, thoughtful, and insightful man who was deeply interested in the biology of iron. He will be dearly missed.
