Hollings Cancer Center Researcher Receives Prestigious Governor's Award for Science

Matthew J. Carpenter, MD

Dr. Matthew J. Carpenter, an associate professor at the Medical University of South Carolina (MUSC) and researcher with the MUSC Hollings Cancer Center, is the recipient of the 2015 Governor’s Young Scientist Award for Excellence in Scientific Research. The award was presented by Lieutenant Governor Henry McMaster at a ceremony at the State House this week.

The Governor's Awards for Excellence in Science, administered by South Carolina Academy of Science (SCAS), were established in 1985 to honor an individual or team within the state whose achievements and contributions to science in South Carolina merit special recognition and to promote wider awareness of the quality and extent of scientific activity in South Carolina. The Young Scientist Award is directed to a gifted young researcher who has demonstrated the potential for major contributions to his discipline.

Dr. Carpenter is an associate professor with the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences and conducts research through the Hollings Cancer Center’s Cancer Control Program. His research, mostly funded through the National Institutes of Health, focuses on tobacco use and smoking cessation techniques.

“Dr. Carpenter has been an important cornerstone in building the Hollings Cancer Center’s Cancer Control Research Program, and he is already rising to stardom in tobacco control research internationally. We are truly fortunate to a have a young scientist of such formidable talents right here in the state of South Carolina,” said Anthony J. Alberg, Blatt Ness Distinguished Endowed Chair in Oncology, Professor of Public Health Sciences, and Interim Director of the Hollings Cancer Center at MUSC. “We can all anticipate seeing firsthand how his contributions to curbing tobacco use will translate into a genuine population health impact in South Carolina and beyond.”

According to Dr. Alberg, Dr. Carpenter joined the faculty at MUSC in 2006 and since that time has been extraordinarily productive both in pursuing high-impact, innovative independent research and in collaborating with other researchers to strengthen their research teams.

Dr. Carpenter received his doctorate in clinical psychology from the University of Vermont in 2003. He was awarded the prestigious Developing Scholar Award at MUSC in 2009, and in 2011, he was awarded the New Investigator Award by the Society for Research on Nicotine and Tobacco. He has served regularly as a reviewer on NIH Study Sections; as a consultant on grants from the University of Vermont, University of Minnesota, and University of Rhode Island; and on two editorial boards and as ad hoc reviewer for many of the major journals in his field.

About Hollings Cancer Center

The Hollings Cancer Center at the Medical University of South Carolina is a National Cancer Institute-designated cancer center and the largest academic-based cancer program in South Carolina. In addition to the full range of clinical services, the cancer center has more than $42 million in cancer research funding and more than 200 clinical trials open to patients.

Hollings offers state-of-the-art diagnostic capabilities, therapies and surgical techniques with multidisciplinary clinics that include surgeons, medical oncologists, radiation therapists, radiologists, pathologists, psychologists and other specialists equipped to the full range of cancer care. For more information, please visit www.hcc.musc.edu.