Vale Professor John Hopper AM
It is with great sadness that we advise Professor John Hopper AM died on Monday 28 October.
A renowned genetic epidemiologist, John contributed to health and wellbeing worldwide. In both breast cancer and colorectal cancer, his research has made a seminal contribution to understanding the roles genetic and environmental factors play.
John was Head of the Breast Cancer Unit in the Centre for Epidemiology and Biostatistics in the Melbourne School of Population and Global Health.
On Monday, John was hosting the annual meeting of his NHMRC MyBRISK (My Breast Cancer Risk) Centre of Research Excellence team, including distinguished colleagues and collaborators from within Australia and overseas.
This was prior to the start of the two-day Why Study Mammographic Density Conference which was due to start on Tuesday. He was most proud of this international meeting, which was convening to share new research and knowledge from around the world to advance our understanding of mammographic density, a strong and heritable risk factor for breast cancer.
John has been working at the University of Melbourne since 1980, has published over 1000 papers and has supervised over 40 graduate research students.
As Director of Twins Research Australia (formerly the Australian Twins Registry), John’s contribution to medical and health research extended to the support of over 120 researchers who have conducted over 230 studies in diverse areas including epilepsy, melanoma and mental health.
In 2008 John was made a Member of the Order of Australia for his service to public health and the biomedical sciences, particularly in the field of genetic epidemiology as an academic and researcher, and to the Australian Twin Registry.
In 2015 he was awarded a Redmond Barry Distinguished Professor title, in recognition of his outstanding leadership.
John will be remembered as a great friend, collaborator and mentor to many in our faculty community. He was passionate about evidence, about challenging pre-conceived ideas, and above all, letting the data tell the story. He was also a great scientist.
Heartfelt condolences are with John’s family, friends, colleagues and students.