Friends honor a legacy of discovery

By Laura Freeman '96

Burke

Few things consumed Thomas Burke ’77 at Holy Cross more completely than the quest to perfect his right-handed hook shot. A lanky guy with a penchant for goofball antics and a passion for basketball, Burke was constantly on the hunt for a pickup game, and friends suspected he may have secretly harbored fantasies of playing for the Celtics.

In the years following his graduation from Holy Cross, however, Burke transferred his energies from the court to the laboratory in pursuit of a weightier goal. Drawing on the chemistry background he gained at Holy Cross, he spent the better part of his career in search of a cancer drug that would improve on the options available for patients undergoing chemotherapy.

Burke came closer than many scientists to a true breakthrough before his research was cut short in 2002 due to a battle with colon cancer. In the final months of his life, he found himself working toward conclusion on the development of a drug that—had it been 10 years further down the development timeline—could potentially have been used to treat his own illness. Picking up where he left off, his former colleagues have recently received approval from the FDA to begin clinical trials—a major hurdle that most potential drugs never clear—and are hopeful that the drug Burke helped develop will soon come to fruition.

When it came time for the 30th reunion of the Class of 1977, his classmates looked for a way to memorialize Burke and also help advance Holy Cross’ tradition of excellence in science education. Guided by the efforts of Stephen Skinner, Brian McNeill and Brian Leary, 12 of Burke’s classmates are together making a joint gift of $200,000 to create a classroom in his honor within the new integrated science complex.

Long Shot

Burke’s path after Holy Cross led him from internships at health organizations in Boston, Washington, D.C., and California to a Ph.D. program at Yale University and a variety of faculty positions at universities around the country. Soon after joining the University of Kentucky, Burke partnered with colleague Dennis Curran to investigate a class of drugs called camptothecins, highly potent cancer drugs capable of turning cellular enzymes into cellular poisons that could be used to eliminate tumors. The problem with these drugs is that they break down very quickly in the bloodstream, making it very difficult to find a dosage that will be powerful enough to have a lasting effect but mild enough not to be overly toxic to the system. Burke and Curran sought to pinpoint a compound with the right combination of chemical and physical properties to avoid the drug’s usual pitfalls.

Using a set of compounds synthesized by Curran’s postdoctoral assistant, David Bom, Burke conducted a series of biochemical, cellular and animal experiments modeling how the compounds would interact in living systems.
He finally settled on the DB-67 compound, so named after the page it occupied in Bom’s notebook. Burke sensed he was very close to achieving a major hurdle that few scientists can clear; when he received his cancer diagnosis, however, he was then confronted with the recognition that the drug he was working to develop could possibly have been used to combat his own particular type of illness, had it only been 10 years further down the development track. In the final months of his life, Burke worried that the progress of the drug, which showed such promise as a better alternative for cancer patients, might simply come to a halt.

The recent FDA approval for clinical trials means that cancer patients may still someday benefit from Burke’s important discoveries. The trials will enable the researchers to determine the appropriate dosage for humans and position the drug to be developed commercially and ultimately used for patient care. Mark Leggas, one researcher currently working on the project, says the drug may be highly effective in the treatment of brain tumors specifically, and that Burke’s discoveries could potentially be the first significant improvement in brain tumor treatments in nearly a decade.

“There are hundreds of thousands of molecules out there, and the likelihood of finding the one with the right combination of physical and chemical properties is infinitesimally small,” Leggas says. He explains that, without the personnel and equipment that pharmaceutical companies have at their disposal to test thousands of compounds in vitro, university researchers have to draw on their intellect to narrow down the field of candidates.

“Burke really had to puzzle out which modifications he needed to make in these molecules and to conduct the right tests to ensure they’re active in living systems,” Leggas explains. “For Burke to reach the point that this molecule is now being prepared to go into the clinic is really remarkable.”

An Enduring Tribute

Burke’s wife, Lori Latus, says that Burke considered his research to be a very tangible way of acting on the service mindset that his Catholic faith and his Holy Cross education instilled in him. She is grateful to Burke’s friends for their unified act of generosity and is glad that the classroom will be a fixed reminder to Burke’s sons, Dylan, aged 10, and Aidan, aged 7, of their father’s contributions to science. She says that hearing Burke’s friends tell stories of his college days keeps his character fresh in the boys’ minds.

Burke’s classmates say their gift was motivated primarily out of admiration and fondness for their friend who is remembered equally for his good humor and his intellect.

“Besides being naturally very bright, Burke was a wonderfully funny and sincere guy and always upbeat,” says McNeill. “It didn’t matter if it was the night before a chemistry final, or the middle of a Nor’easter—he was always smiling. We wanted to create a tangible and permanent memorial that would remind his sons of his accomplishments and, at the same time, support Holy Cross in a project that we believe is very important for the College’s future.”

Laura Freeman ’96 is a freelance writer from Milton, Mass.

 

Reprinted from the Fall 2007 edition of the Holy Cross Magazine.