Michael Jung, Distinguished Professor and UCLA’s Walter and Shirley Wang Chair in Medicinal Drug Discovery, has been selected by the American Chemical Society (ACS) Division of Medicinal Chemistry (MEDI) to receive the 2026 Gertrude Elion Medicinal Chemistry Award in recognition of his impact on medicinal chemistry and drug discovery.
The award honors Gertrude Elion, the Nobel Laureate and pioneering scientist whose work in drug discovery and development helped open doors for women in the field and inspired generations of researchers to achieve excellence. Established in 2023, the award has previously been presented to Christa Müller (2024, University of Bonn) and Sheila DeWitt (2025, DeuteRx).
Jung will deliver a lecture at the MEDI Award Session at the Fall ACS meeting in Chicago. For more information about the award, visit the ACS Division of Medicinal Chemistry’s website.
Jung has made exceptional contributions to UCLA in the areas of research, teaching, and service. In the recent years, he has achieved significant success in the development of drugs for prostate cancer. UCLA has benefited tremendously from Jung’s accomplishments, receiving more than $1.14 billion from the sale of patent rights to the prostate cancer drug Xtandi. His second drug for prostate cancer, Erleada, was approved in 2018. Royalties from those drugs are also supporting fellowships and research at UCLA. Jung has co-founded 14 biotech companies and serves as a consultant or scientific advisory board member for several pharmaceutical and biotech firms. Currently, four drugs from his lab are in Phase 1 or Phase 2 clinical trials. And one – PP405 – will start a pivotal Phase 3 clinical trial later this year.
In recent years, Jung has received numerous prestigious honors recognizing his contributions to medicinal chemistry and drug discovery. In 2025, he received the National Academy of Sciences Award for Chemistry in Service to Society for research addressing important societal needs, particularly his work developing the prostate cancer drugs enzalutamide and apalutamide, which have been used to treat more than one million men. He also received the 2025 Edward E. Smissman Award from the ACS Division of Medicinal Chemistry for his seminal contributions to synthetic medicinal chemistry. In 2024, Jung was inducted into the American Chemical Society Division of Medicinal Chemistry Hall of Fame, recognizing his lasting impact on the field. These recent honors build on earlier recognition such as the 2022 IUPAC-Richter Prize in Medicinal Chemistry, one of the most prestigious international awards in medicinal chemistry, and the 2019 American Association for Cancer Research Award for Outstanding Achievement in Chemistry in Cancer Research.
In 2017, Jung and his wife, Alice, endowed the Michael and Alice Jung Chair in Medicinal Chemistry and Drug Discovery to enable UCLA to recruit and support future scientists and educators. Professor Stuart Conway currently holds the Jung Chair.
Penny Jennings, UCLA Department of Chemistry & Biochemistry, penjen@g.ucla.edu.
