George D. Sorenson, emeritus professor of pathology at the Geisel School of Medicine at Dartmouth College in Lebanon, New Hampshire, died January 28, 2016, at the age of 88. Sorenson was a cofounder, board member, and vice president of the International Association for the Study of Lung Cancer (IASLC).
Born Dec. 24, 1927, in Corry, Pennsylvania, Sorenson entered Pennsylvania State University to study dairy husbandry after graduating from high school. His undergraduate education was interrupted as he served in the U.S. Army, but Sorenson returned to Penn State after an honorary discharge from the Army and graduated with a pre-med degree. He received his medical degree from Thomas Jefferson University Medical College in Philadelphia, and completed his internship and residency at University Hospitals, Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland.
Sorenson joined the faculty at Washington University in St. Louis as an instructor in pathology and a National Cancer Institute (NCI) postdoctoral fellow following his residency and internship.
He later served as associate professor at Washington University and neuropathologist at Barnes Hospital and studied at the Institut de Recherches Scientifique sur le Cancer in Paris as an NCI special fellow. Sorenson was chair of the Department of Pathology at St. Louis University School of Medicine before he joined Dartmouth as chair of the Department of Pathology and the John La Porte Given professor of cytology.
Due to his interest in international medical education and cancer research, Sorenson cofounded the Committee on International Medical Education, of which he later served as president, which brought students from the United States to the University of Lille in France to study medicine. Additionally, he worked collaboratively on small cell carcinoma of the lung with researchers in Switzerland at the Swiss Institute for Experimental Cancer Research in Lausanne. Sorenson was a member of a team of lung cancer researchers invited to China to advise the Chinese government on the detection and treatment of lung cancer, which was an increasing problem in China.
Sorenson was an emeritus member of the AACR who first joined in 1979.
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