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Agenda in Progress: Last Updated on March 19, 2025
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Available On Demand
SESSION 1: Local & systemic immune effects
9:00 a.m. - 9:30 a.m. TALK 1
Michael Angelo, University of Stanford (California, USA)9:30 a.m. - 10:00 a.m. TALK 2
Tullia Bruno, University of Pittsburgh (Pennsylvania, USA)10:00 a.m.- 10:30 a.m. TALK 3
Drew Pardoll, Johns Hopkins University (Maryland, USA)10:30 a.m. - 11:00 a.m. Coffee Break 11:00 a.m. - 11:30 a.m. TALK 4
Frank Winkler, University Hospital Heidelberg (Heidelberg, Germany)11:30 a.m. - 11:45 a.m. SHORT TALK 1 11:45 a.m. - 12:20 p.m. Meet the Editors
Michael Angelo Associate Professor of Pathology Stanford University School of Medicine, California, USAMichael Angelo, MD PhD is a board-certified pathologist and assistant professor in the department of Pathology at Stanford University School of Medicine. Dr. Angelo is a leader in high dimensional imaging with expertise in tissue homeostasis, tumor immunology, and infectious disease. His lab has pioneered the construction and development of Multiplexed Ion Beam Imaging by time of flight (MIBI-TOF). MIBI-TOF uses secondary ion mass spectrometry and metal-tagged antibodies to achieve rapid, simultaneous imaging of dozens of proteins at subcellular resolution. In recognition of this achievement, Dr. Angelo received the NIH Director’s Early Independence award in 2014. His lab has since used this novel technology to discover previously unknown rule sets governing the spatial organization and cellular composition of immune, stromal, and tumor cells within the tumor microenvironment in triple negative breast cancer. These findings were found to be predictive of single cell expression of several immunotherapy drug targets and of 10-year overall survival. This effort has led to ongoing work aimed at elucidating structural mechanisms in the TME that promote recruitment of cancer associated fibroblasts, tumor associated macrophages, and extracellular matrix remodeling. Dr. Angelo is the recipient of the 2020 DOD Era of Hope Award and a principal investigator on multiple extramural awards from the National Cancer Institute, Breast Cancer Research Foundation, Parker Institute for Cancer Immunotherapy, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, and the Human Biomolecular Atlas (HuBMAP) initiative.
Tullia Bruno Assistant Professor, Department of Immunology University of Pittsburgh and UPMC Hillman Cancer Center, Pennsylvania, USATullia C. Bruno, PhD, is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Immunology at the University of Pittsburgh and a faculty member in the Tumor Microenvironment Center and the Cancer Immunology and Immunotherapy Program at the UPMC Hillman Cancer Center. She obtained her Ph.D. in Immunology from Johns Hopkins in 2010 and completed her postdoctoral fellowship at the University of Colorado in 2015—both with a focus in tumor immunology. While Dr. Bruno’s PhD training focused on inhibitory receptors on intertumoral T cells, she became interested in the role of B cells and tertiary lymphoid structures (TLS) in the tumor microenvironment (TME) during her postdoctoral fellowship and has built her independent research program around understanding intertumoral B cell and TLS function in multiple human cancers and physiologically relevant murine models. Because Dr. Bruno’s research lab has an overt focus on studying immunity within cancer patients, her research is highly translational with the potential for future clinical trials targeting B cells and TLS. Finally, given Dr. Bruno's cutting-edge work on analyzing TLS with multispectral imaging and spatial transcriptomics, she is becoming an emerging leader for spatial biology techniques. Dr. Bruno is actively involved in the UPMC Hillman community, and is an advocate for women in science, as is evidenced by her previous role as chair of the UPMC Hillman Women's Initiatives Taskforce and her contributions to the Society of Immunotherapy's Women in Immunotherapy group.
Drew Pardoll Abeloff Professor of Oncology, Medicine, Pathology and Molecular Biology and Genetics Johns Hopkins University, Maryland, USADr. Pardoll is the Abeloff Professor of Oncology, Medicine, Pathology and Molecular Biology and Genetics at the Johns Hopkins University, School of Medicine. He is the Director of the Bloomberg~Kimmel Institute for Cancer Immunotherapy and Co-Director of the Cancer Immunology Program at the Sidney Kimmel Comprehensive Cancer Center at Johns Hopkins.
Dr. Pardoll attended Johns Hopkins University, where he earned his M.D., Ph.D., in 1982 and completed his Medical Residency and Oncology Fellowship in 1985. He then worked for three years at the National Institutes of Health as a Medical Staff Fellow. Dr. Pardoll joined the departments of oncology and medicine in 1988. Dr. Pardoll has published over 300 papers as well as over 20 book chapters on the subject of T cell immunology and cancer vaccines. He has served on the editorial board of the Journal of the National Cancer Institute and Cancer Cell, and has served as a member of scientific advisory boards for the Cancer Research Institute, the University of Pennsylvania Human Gene Therapy Gene Institute, Biologic Resources Branch of the National Cancer Institute, Harvard-Dana Farber Cancer Center, Cerus Corporation, Global Medical Products Corporation, Genencor Corporation, CellGenesys Corporation, Mojave Therapeutics, the American Association of Clinical Oncology and the American Association of Cancer Research.
Dr. Pardoll has made a number of basic advances in Cellular Immunology, including the discovery of gamma - delta T cells, NKT cells and interferon-producing killer dendritic cells. Over the past two decades, Dr. Pardoll has studied molecular aspects of dendritic cell biology and immune regulation, particularly related to mechanisms by which cancer cells evade elimination by the immune system. He is an inventor of a number of immunotherapies, including GVAX cancer vaccines and Listeria monocytogenes based cancer vaccines. Dr. Pardoll’s basic immunology discoveries include the identification of gd-T cells, NKT cells and IKDC. He elucidated the role of Stat3 signaling in tumor immune evasion and in Th17 development, leading to the discovery that Stat3-driven Th17 responses promote carcinogenesis. Dr. Pardoll discovered one of the two ligands for the PD-1 inhibitory receptor and leads the Hopkins cancer immunology program that developed PD-1 pathway-targeted antibodies, demonstrating their clinical activity in multiple cancer types.
His more than 300 articles cover cancer vaccines, gene therapies, cancer prevention technologies, recombinant immune modulatory agents for specific pathways that regulate immunity to cancer and infectious diseases.
Frank Winkler Managing Senior Physician in the Department of Neurology University Hospital Heidelberg, Heidelberg, GermanyProfessor Frank Winkler is a managing senior physician in the Department of Neurology at the University of Heidelberg and group leader at the German Cancer Research Center. He studied medicine in Hamburg, Freiburg and London, specialized in Neurology at the LMU Munich, spent a 2 year postdoc at Harvard, and was appointed to Heidelberg in 2010.
Dr Winklers’ work has been published in Nature, Cell, Nature Medicine, Cancer Cell. In 2022 he received the German Cancer Award and in 2024 the BIAL award for Biomedcine. His work focusses on the interaction of the nervous system with cancer, pioneering the field of Cancer Neuroscience, and launching investigator-initiated trial concepts. -
Available On Demand
SESSION II: Local and systemic metabolic influences
2:00 p.m. - 2:30 p.m. TALK 5
Selma Masri, University of California, Irvine (California, USA)2:30 p.m. - 3:00 p.m. Host, microbial, and tumor metabolism: the impact of obesity and diet on melanoma biology and the anti-tumor immune response
Jennifer McQuade, The University of Texas, MD Anderson Cancer Center (Texas, USA)3:00 p.m. - 3:30 p.m. Metabolic crosstalk in the tumor microenvironment and cancer immunotherapy
Ping Chi Ho, University of Lausanne (Vaud, Switzerland)3:30 p.m. - 4:00 p.m. Coffee Break 4:00 p.m. - 4:15 p.m. Short Talk 2 4:15 p.m. - 4:45 p.m. TALK 8
Matt Vander Heiden, MIT (Massachusetts, USA)4:45 p.m. - 5:00 p.m. Short Talk 3 5:00 p.m. - 5:30 p.m. Flash Talks
Selma Masri Associate Professor, Department of Biological Chemistry University of California, Irvine, California, USASelma received her Ph.D. in Cancer Biology from the City of Hope in 2009 and completed her postdoctoral training in Circadian Biology and Metabolism, with an emphasis on circadian disruption and tumorigenesis. Selma is currently an Assistant Professor in the Department of Biological Chemistry at UC Irvine, a member the Chao Family Comprehensive Cancer Center, and a member of the Center for Epigenetics and Metabolism. Selma was named a V Foundation Scholar in 2018.
Jennifer McQuade Associate Professor, Department of Melanoma Medical Oncology, Division of Cancer Medicine The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Texas, USAJennifer L. McQuade, MD, MS, MA is an Assistant Professor and Physician Scientist in Melanoma Medical Oncology. Dr. McQuade completed her medical training at Baylor College of Medicine, her residency at the University of Pennsylvania, and her fellowship at MD Anderson Cancer Center, and then spent two years in MD Anderson's prestigious Advanced Scholar program conducting research and completing a Master's in Science in Clinical and Translational Science before joining the clinical faculty in 2018. Her research focuses on how lifestyle factors influence melanoma biology and the anti-tumor immune response with the goal of developing novel strategies to improve outcomes in melanoma. In addition, Dr. McQuade holds a Master's degree in traditional Chinese medicine, spending time as a Fulbright fellow in China, and conducted studies of integrative therapies for symptom control in cancer.
Ping-Chih Ho Member, Ludwig Institute for Cancer Research and Professor Professor, University of Lausanne, Vaud, SwitzerlandPing-Chih Ho grew up in Taiwan and obtained his basic biomedical training, including bachelor degree (Life Science) and master degree (Biochemical Science), at National Taiwan University. He then obtained his PhD in Department of Pharmacology at University of Minnesota and did a postdoctoral training at Yale University. He is a full professor at University of Lausanne and member of Ludwig Institute for Cancer Research since 2023.
Matt Vander Heiden Director, Koch Institute for Integrative Cancer Research MIT, Massachusetts, United StatesMatthew Vander Heiden is the Director of the Koch Institute for Integrative Cancer Research, the Lester Wolfe Chair in Molecular Biology, and a Professor in the Department of Biology at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He is also an Institute Member of the Broad Institute of Harvard and MIT. He is also a practicing Medical Oncologist and Instructor of Medicine at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and Harvard Medical School. Vander Heiden received his MD and PhD degrees from the University of Chicago, where he worked in the laboratory of Craig Thompson. He completed clinical training in internal medicine at the Brigham and Women’s Hospital and a Hematology-Oncology fellowship at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute/Massachusetts General Hospital program. He was a post-doctoral fellow in the laboratory of Lewis Cantley at Harvard Medical School, where he was supported by a Mel Karmazin Fellowship from the Damon Runyon Cancer Research Foundation. In 2010, Vander Heiden joined the MIT faculty. His laboratory studies how metabolism is regulated to meet the needs of cells in different physiological situations. A major focus of his research is the role of metabolism in cancer, and particularly how metabolic pathways support cancer cell proliferation and survival. Using a combination of biochemistry, molecular biology and mouse models, the aim of the Vander Heiden laboratory is to understand how metabolism influences different stages of tumor biology with a goal to improve cancer treatment in the clinic. His work has been recognized by some awards, including the Burroughs Wellcome Fund Career Award for Medical Sciences, the AACR Gertrude B. Elion Award, an NCI Outstanding Investigator Award, and election to the ASCI, AAP, and European Academy of Cancer Sciences. He serves on the scientific advisory boards of the Yale Cancer Center, the Salk Institute Cancer Center, and the Wistar Cancer Center. He is a member of the investment advisory board for DROIA Venture Fund and MPM, is also a member of the scientific advisory boards of several companies including Agios Pharmaceuticals, iTeos Therapeutics, Sage Therapeutics, Lime Therapeutics, Pretzel Therapeutics, and Auron Therapeutics, where he is also an academic founder -
Available On Demand
SESSION III: The metastatic tumor ecosystem
9:00 a.m. - 9:30 a.m. TALK 9
Amanda Lund, NYU Langone Health (New York, USA)9:30 a.m. - 10:30 a.m. KEYNOTE PRESENTATION 1
Mikala Egeblad, Johns Hopskins University (Maryland, USA)10:30 a.m. - 11:00 a.m. Coffee Break 11:00 a.m. - 11:30 a.m. TALK 10
Cedric Blanpain, Universite Libre de Bruxelles (Brussels, Belgium)11: 30 a.m. - 12:00 p.m. TALK 11
David Lyden, Cornell University (New York, USA)12:00 p.m. - 12:30 p.m. TALK 12
Michele De Palma, Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne (Lausanne, Switzerland)12:30 p.m. - 12:45 p.m. Short Talk 3
Amanda Lund Principal Investigator and Associate Professor, Ronald O. Perelman Department of Dermatology NYU Langone Health, New York, USA
KEYNOTE SPEAKER: Mikala Egeblad Co-leader of the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Cancer Center Program on Cellular Communication in Cancer Johns Hopkins University, Maryland, USAMikala Egeblad, Ph.D. is a professor at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, co-leader of the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Cancer Center Program on Cellular Communication in Cancer, and chair-person of the American Association for Cancer Research Tumor Microenvironment Working Group. She obtained degrees in Medicine (B.S., 1993). Human Biology (M.Sc., 1996), and Cancer Biology (Ph.D., 2000) from the University of Copenhagen, Denmark. She did her dissertation research under the mentorship of Dr. Marja Jäättelä at The Danish Cancer Society. Her postdoctoral training was performed with Dr. Zena Werb at University of California, San Francisco. There, she began developing intravital spinning disk confocal microscopy to understand how the microenvironment influences tumor progression. Her research group studies how the tumor microenvironment contributes to therapy resistance and metastasis, primarily focusing on the role of neutrophils and macrophages. She has received the Department of Defense Breast Cancer Research Program Era of Hope Scholar Award; The Pershing Square Sohn Prize for Young Investigators in Cancer Research; and the Suffrage Science Award. She is member of the Scientific Advisory Board for Vividion, Inc. and of Insmed’s Brensocatib Research Advisory Board.
Cedric Blanpain Professor of Stem Cell and Developmental Biology Université Libre de Bruxelles (ULB), BelgiumCedric Blanpain graduated as a Medical Doctor (1995), received his PhD in Medical Sciences (2001) and was board certified in internal medicine (2002) from the Université Libre de Bruxelles (ULB), Belgium. He performed a postdoctoral training in the laboratory of Elaine Fuchs, at the Rockefeller University from 2002 to 2006. Cédric Blanpain started his laboratory in October 2006 as “chercheur qualifié” of the Belgian Fonds National de la Recherche Scientifique (FNRS).Cedric Blanpain received several prestigious and highly competitive awards including EMBO Young investigator award, ERC starting, ERC consolidator and ERC advanced grants, the outstanding young investigator award of the ISSCR 2012, the Liliane Bettencourt award for life sciences 2012, the Joseph Maisin Award for basic biomedical Science 2015, the Francqui prize 2020, the European Association for Cancer Research’s Mike Price gold medal 2022, the momentum award of the ISSCR 2023 and the Fondation ARC Léopold Griffuel Award for basic research 2024 . He has been elected member of the EMBO, the Belgian Royal Academy of Medicine, the Academia Europaea, the French Academy of Science, and the American Academy of Arts & Sciences.
David Lyden Professor Weill Cornell Medicine, School of Medical Sciences, New York, USADr. David Lyden is an authority on the mechanisms by which cancer metastasizes throughout the body, particularly through the establishment of blood vessels that tumors need to grow and spread. He is the Stavros S. Niarchos Chair and runs a laboratory studying the biology of medulloblastoma and high-grade gliomas. His lab is working to understand how cells in the environment around a tumor foster tumor growth. In addition to research, Dr. Lyden teaches fellows, residents, medical students, graduate students, and MD/PhD students in the Tri-Institutional MD/PhD Program, which includes The Rockefeller University, and has been recognized with several awards. His work has been published in major scientific journals such as Nature, Cell, and Science, and he is the lead editor of a major textbook called Cancer Metastasis: Biologic Basis and Therapeutics, the first textbook dedicated to research on metastasis and the treatment of metastatic disease. Dr. Lyden also serve on the board of the Tumor Microenvironment Steering Committee and the Metastasis Steering Committee of the American Association of Cancer Research.
Michele de Palma Associate professor, School of Life Sciences EPFL (Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne), SwitzerlandMiki De Palma obtained his PhD in 2004 at the University of Torino Medical School (Italy), where he studied the role of the bone marrow-derived monocytes in tumor angiogenesis. He then moved to the San Raffaele Scientific Institute in Milan to pursue novel cancer gene therapy strategies based on gene-modified monocytes, which have been clinically tested in patients with brain cancer. In 2018, he has been appointed Associate Professor at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (EPFL) in Lausanne, Switzerland. His current research focuses on engineered dendritic cells for antigen-agnostic cancer immunotherapy. -
Available On Demand
SESSION IV: Systemic and organ-tumor crosstalk
2:45 p.m. - 3:15 p.m. TALK 13
Maria Rescigno, Humanitas University (Rozzano, Italy)3:15 p.m. - 3:45 p.m. TALK 14
Marcus Goncalves, New York University (New York, USA)3:45 p.m. - 4:15 p.m. Coffee Break 4:15 p.m. - 4:45 p.m. TALK 15
Marcia Haigis, Harvard Medical School (Massachusettes, USA)4:45 p.m. - 5:15 p.m. TALK 16
Nikhil Joshi, Yale School of Medicine (Connecticut, USA)5:15 p.m. - 6:15 p.m. Panel Discussion
Maria Rescigno Vice Rector and Delegate for Research Humanitas University, Rozzano, ItalyMaria Rescigno graduated in Biology in 1990 at the University of Milan. From 1991 to 1994 she worked at the University of Cambridge, UK, in the Department of Biochemistry, as a visiting scholar. From 1995 to 1999, she worked at the National Research Council of Milan where she received her PhD in Pharmacology and toxicology in 1999. From 1999 to 2001 she worked at the University of Milano-Bicocca where she specialized in Applied Biotechnology. From 2001 to 2017 she was the director of the Dendritic cell biology and immunotherapy Unit at the Department of Experimental Oncology at the European Institute of oncology. She authored more than 130 publications. In 2008-2013 she was visiting professor at the University of Oslo. In 2016 Maria Rescigno founded Postbiotica a microbiota start-up.
Marcus Goncalves Director, Systemic Metabolism Research NYU Langone Health, New York, USAMarcus Goncalves is a physician scientist at NYU Langone Health in beautiful New York City. His lab is focused on the effects of diet and cancer on the host tissues that regulate systemic nutrient metabolism. As a practicing endocrinologist, he has helped to develop therapeutic and dietary strategies to modulate systemic glucose and insulin levels in patients with obesity, diabetes, and cancer. MG’s clinical practice focuses on the care of patients with metabolic diseases like insulin resistance, type 2 diabetes, low testosterone, and complications from cancer and cancer therapy like cachexia.
Marcia Haigis Professor, Department of Cell Biology Harvard Medical School, Massachusetts, USAMarcia C. Haigis, Ph.D., is a Professor in the Department of Cell Biology at Harvard Medical School in Boston, MA, a member of the Paul F. Glenn Center for the Biology of Aging, and the Ludwig Center at Harvard Medical School. Following graduate training in Biochemistry at the University of Wisconsin-Madison in Biochemistry, Dr. Haigis studied mitochondrial metabolism during her postdoctoral research at MIT. She has contributed to understanding the role that mitochondrial sirtuins play in metabolism and disease. She has received a number of honors, including the Ellison Medical Foundation New Scholar Award, the Brookdale Foundation Leadership in Aging Award, and selection for the National Academy of Medicine's Emerging Leaders in Health and Medicine Program.
Nikhil Joshi Associate Professor Tenur Yale Medical School, Connecticut, USAThe Joshi laboratory uses intricate tumor models and advanced approaches to investigate immune cell interactions with developing tumors. The goal is to determine mechanistically why these interactions do not lead to more potent anti-tumor responses and to identify entry points for modulating these interactions through genetic manipulation and therapeutic intervention. Our studies focus on using established complex mouse models to investigate how subtypes of T cells function in the tumor microenvironment and how their interactions with other immune cell types impacts tumor development. Our laboratory combines advanced genetic modeling of mice and immunologic techniques to address fundamental questions in tumor immunology. -
Available On Demand
SESSION V: The patient as the focus
9:00 a.m. - 9:30 a.m From bench to bedside: the promise of engineered NK cell therapy
Katy Rezvani, University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center (Texas, USA)9:30 a.m. - 10:00 a.m. Modeling the impact of concomitant medications and comoridities towards immune checkpoint inhibitor treatment efficacy in patients with cancer
Arabella Young, University of Utah (Utah, USA)10:00 a.m - 10:30 a.m. TALK 19
Humam Kadara, University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center (Texas, USA)10:30 a.m. - 11:00 a.m. Coffee Break 11:00 a.m. - 12:00 p.m. KEYNOTE PRESENTATION 2
Miriam Chalabi, Netherlands Cancer Institute (Amsterdam, Netherlands)12:00 p.m. - 12:30 p.m. TALK 20
Li Ding, Washington University, Saint Louis (Missouri, USA)12:30 p.m. - 1:00 p.m. TALK 21
Amy Moran, Oregon Health & Science University (Oregon, USA)1:00 p.m. - 1:15 p.m. SHORT TALK 5 1:15 p.m. - 1:30 p.m. Closing Remarks
Katy Rezvani Professor of Medicine MD Anderson, Texas, USAKaty Rezvani, MD, PhD is a professor of medicine at the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, where she serves as the Vice President & Head, Cell Therapy Institute for Discovery and Innovation, Sally Cooper Murray Chair in Cancer Research, and medical director of the GMP Facility. She leads a research lab with a focus on NK cell biology and developing novel NK cell engineering strategies for cancer, with the aim of translating these discoveries to the clinic. Dr. Rezvani completed her medical training at University College London, England and her PhD at Imperial College London. She completed her training in immunology and transplantation biology at the National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, MD. In addition, she has co-authored over 250 peer-reviewed publications and received multiple prizes and awards, including the American Society of Hematology E. Donnall Thomas award.
Arabella Young Assistant Professor, Department of Pathology Huntsman Cancer Institute, University of Utah, Salt Lake City, UtahDr. Arabella Young, Ph.D., is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Pathology and Investigator at the Huntsman Cancer Institute at the University of Utah. Following graduate training in tumor immunology at the University of Queensland, she performed her postdoctoral studies at the Diabetes Center at the University of California San Francisco.
Dr. Young’s research aims to improve our understanding of the interaction between different immune-mediated diseases, which have the potential to influence treatment outcomes for patients with cancer. Her lab has established syngeneic tumor models in autoimmune-prone mice to improve mechanistic understanding of the relationship between anti-tumor immunity and immunotoxicity in response to cancer immunotherapies. Additionally, she is advancing modeling approaches that incorporate the impact of medication exposure for comorbidities alongside cancer immunotherapy efficacy, in an effort to optimize treatment outcomes for patients.
Humam Kadara Professor, Department of Translational Molecular Pathology, Division of Pathology/Lab Medicine The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Texas, USADr. Humam Kadara is a professor in Translational Molecular Pathology at The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center. His lab made fundamental discoveries in the cellular genesis of early lung cancer. With his group, he is keen to discover mechanisms underlying the earliest stages in cancer development and to leverage this information to identify ideal targets for cancer prevention, interception and early treatment. Outside the lab, and when he is not busy with grant/paper writing and administrative work, Dr. Kadara loves cooking with his family, reading history books, watching soccer and playing with his young kids.
KEYNOTE SPEAKER: Myriam Chalabi Medical Oncologist. Dept. Of Gastrointestinal Oncology Netherlands Cancer Institute, Amsterdam, NetherlandsAfter graduating Medical School (2008) Myriam Chalabi did her residency in internal medicine/medical oncology. In 2016 she became staff member at the Netherlands Cancer Institute in Amsterdam as a Gastrointestinal Oncologist and clinician scientist. In 2022 she was named one of the 11 early career researchers to watch by Nature Medicine.
She is the lead investigator (PI) of several neoadjuvant immunotherapy trials in gastrointestinal cancers, including the globally renowned NICHE study, in which patients with colon cancers were found to have impressive responses after a short duration of neoadjuvant immunotherapy. Her research focuses on early innovative combination immunotherapy trials with a strong focus on translational research to better understand the drivers of response in these tumors and find novel immunotherapy combinations. Her main goal is to improve immunotherapy for patients with gastrointestinal cancers.
Li Ding Director of Computational Biology, Oncology Assistant Director at McDonnell Genome Institute Washington University, Missouri, USALi Ding, PhD, is the David English Smith Distinguished Professor of Medicine at Washington University. Dr. Ding's research focuses on integrating cancer proteogenomics (including single cell and spatial omics), patient-derived cancer models, functional genomics, and drug development to advance cancer biology and precision medicine. This work spans many cancer types, including acute myeloid leukemia, breast cancer, kidney cancer, pancreatic cancer, prostate cancer, glioblastoma, and multiple myeloma, with key findings including the identification and characterization of pathogenic germline variants and somatic cancer drivers, and discovery of age-related clonal hematopoiesis. Her research team has also developed widely-used computational tools, including VarScan, SciClone, BreakDancer, MSIsensor, Pindel-C, HotSpot3D, and MuSiC and she plays significant roles and co-chairs various groups within The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA), the International Cancer Genome Consortium (ICGC), the Clinical Proteomic Tumor Analysis Consortium (CPTAC), the Patient-Derived Xenografts Development and Trial Centers Research Network (PDXNet), Patient Engagement and Cancer Genome Sequencing (PE-CGS), Cellular Senescence Network (SenNet), and Human Tumor Atlas Network (HTAN). She also serves on the Steering Committees of CPTAC, TCGA, PDXnet, PE-CGS, SenNet, and co-chairs the HTAN Steering Committee. Dr. Ding has been recognized several times among Thomson-Reuters’ surveys of influential researchers, including listing among “The World’s Most Influential Scientific Minds”, and was a member of a group honored with the American Association of Cancer Research Team Science Award for contributions to TCGA. Her work continues to be inspired by the ultimate goal of making personalized medicine a reality for cancer patients.
Amy Moran Associate Professor of Cell, Developmental and Cancer Biology, School of Medicine Oregon Health & Science University, Oregon, USADr. Moran has a long-standing interest in understanding how the T cell microenvironment shapes the immunological response upon T cell activation. She has a broad background in basic immunology with specific training and expertise T cell receptor signal strength and fate decisions, tumor models, and cancer immunotherapy. Her current research seeks to understand the mechanism of action of single agent and combination therapies in models of prostate cancer. These studies parlay from work during her postdoctoral training that uncovered novel mechanisms of synergy between OX40 agonists and PD-L1 blockade in models of sarcoma and adenocarcinomas published in The Journal of Immunology and under review in Cancer Cell. Studies in her independent laboratory focus on understanding how hormone ablation therapies reverse immunesenescence in tumor bearing hosts with a particular interest in prostate cancer. These studies explore the metabolic health and plasticity of tumor-antigen specific T cells in aged hosts and the impact of sex steroid ablation and checkpoint blockade on increasing the bioenergetics potential of these cells. In addition, we explore the impact of restoring thymic function together with PD-1 inhibition in tumor-bearing hosts and the impact this has on the immune repertoire, function, and regulatory T cell differentiation.
