Michael Stratton

Michael Stratton co-discovered the BRCA2 breast cancer susceptibility gene and as Director of the Sanger Institute has led the systematic cataloging of somatic mutations in cancer through the COSMIC database and the International Cancer Genome Consortium. His discovery of mutational signatures in cancer revealed that specific mutagenic processes leave characteristic imprints in the cancer genome, enabling inference of cancer etiology from sequencing data. His vision of comprehensively mapping the somatic mutation landscape of all cancer types has been foundational to precision oncology.