# Yosef Yarden

Source: https://onco.cc/people/yosef-yarden/  
OnCo record `yosef-yarden` (Person). Data CC BY-NC 4.0, attribute "Data from OnCo (onco.cc)"; commercial use needs a licence.

## TL;DR

One of the people who worked out what the HER family of receptors does and how antibodies against them behave, including why combining two antibodies against the same receptor works better than either alone.

## Summary

Yosef Yarden's laboratory at the Weizmann Institute has spent four decades on the ErbB/HER receptor family: how EGFR and HER2 dimerise and signal, how the cell shuts them down, and how tumours escape drugs aimed at them. With Michael Sela he published a long series showing that pairs of antibodies against distinct epitopes of the same receptor outperform either alone, by driving receptor endocytosis and ubiquitination, including the 2009 PNAS paper on persistent elimination of HER2-overexpressing tumours. That is mechanistic evidence convergent with the clinical pairing of trastuzumab and pertuzumab, not a documented causal path to it, and this record does not claim more. His recent reviews trace how resistance to EGFR inhibitors in lung cancer emerges and how it might be pre-empted, and he also publishes on endocrine resistance in breast cancer and androgen-receptor resistance in prostate cancer.

## Fields

- Kind: Person
- Last checked: 2026-09-25
- Tags: scientist; cancer-biology
- Role: Professor, Department of Immunology and Regenerative Biology, Weizmann Institute of Science
- Specialisms: ErbB/HER receptor signalling; EGFR biology; Antibody combinations; Resistance to targeted therapy

## Sources

- Yarden laboratory, Weizmann Institute: https://www.weizmann.ac.il/Biological_Regulation/Yarden/
- PubMed author search: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/?term=Yarden%20Y%5BAuthor%5D%20Weizmann%20EGFR

## Connected records

- cancers: [HER2-positive breast cancer](https://onco.cc/cancers/breast-her2-positive/), [Non-small-cell lung cancer](https://onco.cc/cancers/nsclc/)
- fronts: [Drug Discovery Platforms](https://onco.cc/fronts/drug-discovery/), [Targeted Therapy](https://onco.cc/fronts/targeted-therapy/)
- technologies: [Monoclonal antibodies](https://onco.cc/technologies/monoclonal-antibody/)
- targets: [EGFR](https://onco.cc/targets/egfr/), [HER2](https://onco.cc/targets/her2/)
- institutions: [Weizmann Institute of Science](https://onco.cc/institutions/weizmann/)

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