2025 Double Helix Medals dinner raises over $7 million
NEW YORK, Nov. 20, 2025 /PRNewswire/ -- Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory (CSHL) returned to New York City's American Museum of Natural History on November 19, 2025, for the 20th annual Double Helix Medals dinner. CBS journalist Lesley Stahl emceed the event, which raised over $7 million for CSHL's biological research and education programs. This year's gala honored tennis legends-turned-cancer advocates Chris Evert and Martina Navratilova and biotechnology pioneer Dr. Robert Langer.
Evert and Navratilova are two of the most decorated tennis players in sports history. Both overcame cancer diagnoses with the same grit and determination that earned them each 18 Grand Slam singles titles. Off the court, they have emerged as vocal advocates for cancer research, prevention, and early detection.
"We both realize we have such an opportunity to spread the good word," Navratilova said. "It makes you feel good when people say you made a difference. If you feel something, do something. Don't sit on it. Chris is the living example of that."
"If I hadn't had genetic testing, I wouldn't be here," said Evert. "Don't think you're a wimp if you go to the doctor and get checked out."
Dr. Robert Langer is one of only nine MIT Institute Professors and the most cited engineer in history. His research, alongside Dr. Judah Folkman, isolated the first angiogenesis inhibitors, leading to new treatments for cancer and blindness. Langer created the first nanoparticles and microparticles for delivering large molecules, including nucleic acids. His work helped establish the field of tissue engineering, enabling the development of artificial skin for burn victims, among other advances.
"I'm proudest of my students," Langer says. "They've done amazing things and keep training the next generations. I hope I'm remembered as a person who challenged conventional wisdom in science and engineering and made discoveries and inventions that ended up changing the world."
The 2025 Double Helix Medals dinner was chaired by Mrs. Jeanne Moutoussamy-Ashe, Ms. Jamie Nicholls and Mr. O. Francis Biondi, Mr. and Mrs. David Boies, Ms. Barbara Amonson and Dr. Vincent Della Pietra, Drs. Pamela Hurst-Della Pietra and Stephen Della Pietra, Mr. and Mrs. John M. Desmarais, Mr. and Mrs. Jeffrey E. Kelter, Dr. and Mrs. Tomislav Kundic, Mr. and Mrs. Robert D. Lindsay, Ms. Ivana Stolnik-Lourie and Dr. Robert W. Lourie, Dr. Marcia Kramer Mayer, Dr. and Mrs. Howard L. Morgan, Ms. Judy Gibbons and Dr. Francesco Scattone, Dr. and Mrs. Phillip A. Sharp, and Mr. and Mrs. Paul J. Taubman.
Since 2006, the Double Helix Medals dinner has raised over $80 million to support CSHL's research and education programs.
About Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory
Founded in 1890, Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory has shaped contemporary biomedical research and education with programs in cancer, neuroscience, plant biology and quantitative biology. Home to eight Nobel Prize winners, the private, not-for-profit Laboratory employs 1,000 people including 600 scientists, students and technicians. For more information, visit www.cshl.edu.
SOURCE Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory
Share this article