John MacMillan, vice chancellor for research at the University of California, Santa Cruz, is a professor in the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, where his research laboratory focuses on the discovery and characterization of biologically active molecules from microorganisms. This research has focused predominately on the therapeutic areas of infectious disease and oncology, combining phenotypic screening, isolation and mechanism of action studies towards the discovery of more than one hundred new natural products. This work has led to establishment of the Center for High Functional Annotation of Natural Products, a multi-institutional center funded by the National Institutes of Health to study the mechanism of botanicals and natural products. His work in oncology has yielded a first-in-class inhibitor of Hypoxia Inducible Factor 2 that is currently undergoing clinical trials for the treatment of renal cell carcinoma.
MacMillan holds a Ph.D. in chemistry from the University of California, Davis. Prior to moving to the UC Santa Cruz, he was on faculty at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center.