Alexander Drilon

Alexander Drilon, MD, is the Chief of Early Drug Development Service and an Attending Physician at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, and one of the world's leading authorities on RET- and NTRK-rearranged cancers. His research has been central to the clinical development of selective RET inhibitors—selpercatinib (LOXO-292) and pralsetinib—which achieved landmark response rates in RET fusion-positive non-small cell lung cancer and thyroid cancer, transforming a historically challenging molecular subtype into one with highly effective targeted therapy options. He has also been a key investigator in the development of larotrectinib and entrectinib, the first tumor-agnostic NTRK inhibitors approved by the FDA. Drilon's expertise in oncogene-driven cancers extends across multiple molecular subtypes including MET exon 14 skipping mutations, NRG1 fusions, HER2 mutations, and FGFR alterations, reflecting his role as a leading early drug development investigator at MSK. He has conducted and led numerous first-in-human and phase II trials for novel targeted agents, establishing response rates, characterizing resistance mechanisms, and identifying companion biomarker strategies. His translational work on RET resistance has defined secondary RET mutations and bypass pathway activation as key mechanisms, informing the design of combination and next-generation strategies. Drilon is a prolific author and frequent international speaker who has contributed to ASCO, NCCN, and IASLC guidelines on the management of molecularly defined NSCLC subtypes. He is an active mentor committed to training the next generation of thoracic oncology investigators and early-phase clinical trialists. His career represents the transformative power of molecular precision oncology applied systematically across multiple rare but targetable genomic alterations.