2021 V SCHOLAR SUMMIT

APRIL 27-28

2021 V SCHOLAR SUMMIT WELCOME Welcome to our annual V Scholar Summit! I am so happy to share this incredible opportunity for learning and collaboration with you. This event is truly my favorite of the year, and having to cancel it last year due to the Covid-19 pandemic was disappointing for everyone. This year, we have moved to a virtual format, and we hope to provide you many of the same opportunities for networking and professional development that the in-person event provided. We have all come through an extremely difficult year, but better days are in sight. Our Victory Over Cancer® commitment remains strong, and we are delighted to offer you this added educational and networking opportunity as part of the V family.

These two days will include virtual training sessions with the Alan Alda Center for Communicating Science, interactive poster sessions using the iPosterSessions platform, informative sessions with experts and scientific advisors on timely topics, a Q&A mentoring session with past V Scholars and time to share your work and CAROLE WEGNER, PH.D., HCLD experiences with your colleagues, hopefully forming new friendships and possibly new collaborations. Thanks to generous donors, and to your dedication to research, we can work towards a future without cancer. You Senior Vice President, Research and Grants Administration are the hope for patients and their families. You are a part of our V family, and we applaud your innovative THE V FOUNDATION FOR CANCER RESEARCH thinking and your tireless work to stop cancer. We hope this V Scholar Summit will be valuable to you as you move forward in your research and career. And next year - we hope to see you in person!

2021 V SCHOLAR SUMMIT SPEAKERS

2021 V SCHOLAR SUMMIT

2021 V SCHOLAR SUMMIT NADINE J. BARRETT, PH.D., MA., M.S. GERARD BLOBE, M.D., PH.D. Assistant Professor, Family Medicine and Community Health 2003 V SCHOLAR Associate Director, Equity, and Community and Stakeholder Strategy Professor of Medicine Director, Center for Equity in Research Professor of Pharmacology and Cancer Biology DUKE CLINICAL TRANSLATIONAL SCIENCE INSTITUTE AND DUKE CANCER INSTITUTE DUKE UNIVERSITY MEDICAL CENTER

Barrett is an assistant professor in the Department of Family Medicine and Community Health at Duke University. Blobe is a professor of medicine in Pharmacology and Cancer Biology at Duke University School of Medicine, and She currently holds a joint senior leadership role as the associate director of Equity, and Community and Stakeholder he is the associate director of training and education for the Duke Cancer Institute. Blobe’s laboratory at Duke Strategy for the Duke Cancer Institute and the Duke Clinical Translational Science Institute, and directs the Center University investigates the role of TGF-β superfamily signaling in cancer biology, focusing on mechanisms for for Equity in Research. A medical sociologist by training, Barrett is a health disparities researcher, expert equity their dichotomous tumor promoting and suppressing function, their role in the tumor microenvironment, as well strategist, and a nationally-recognized leader in facilitating community/stakeholder and academic partnerships to as investigating strategies for targeting these pathways. Clinically he specializes in treatment of patients with advance health equity and developing training and methods to address implicit bias and structural and systemic colorectal and pancreatic cancer and in phase I therapeutics. racism that limits diverse participation in biomedical research. Her goals are to integrate diverse stakeholder engagement in the research process and healthcare systems, increase enrollment of underrepresented groups in biomedical research, increase diversity in the research workforce and advance health equity. Prior to her current role, Barrett was the inaugural director of the Duke Cancer Institute’s Office of Health Equity, where for eight years she led a team to create a nationally awarded community engagement model to advance health equity, through patient navigation, nationally funded pipeline training programs for underrepresented race and ethnic groups, and authentic community partnerships to inform and drive research and quality healthcare as advisors, experts, and participants. Her leadership in both nonprofit and academia spans local, national and international partnerships to better serve and engage historically marginalized and underserved populations.

SPEAKERS 2021 V SCHOLAR SUMMIT CHRISTINA CURTIS, PH.D., MSC BLOSSOM DAMANIA, PH.D. 2012 V SCHOLAR 2001 V SCHOLAR Associate Professor of Medicine and Genetics Boshamer Distinguished Professor and Vice Dean for Research STANFORD UNIVERSITY SCHOOL OF MEDICINE UNIVERSITY OF NORTH CAROLINA AT CHAPEL HILL SCHOOL OF MEDICINE Co-Director, Molecular Tumor Board STANFORD CANCER INSTITUTE

Curtis is an associate professor and endowed scholar in the Department of Medicine and Department of Genetics Damania is the Boshamer Distinguished Professor and vice dean for research in the school of medicine at the at Stanford University, where she leads the Cancer Computational and Systems Biology Laboratory. Curtis also University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. She is a professor in the Department of Microbiology and Immunology serves as the director of breast cancer translational research and co-director of the Molecular Tumor Board and is a member of the Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center at UNC-Chapel Hill. at the Stanford Cancer Institute. Curtis’ work is focused on leveraging genome-scale data and computational modeling to predict disease progression and treatment response. Her research has redefined the molecular Damania obtained her bachelor’s degree from Mount Holyoke College and her Ph.D. from the cell and molecular map of breast cancer and led to new paradigms in understanding how human tumors evolve and metastasize. biology program at the University of Pennsylvania. She was a postdoctoral fellow at Harvard Medical School Curtis has been the recipient of numerous awards, including the National Institutes of Health Director’s Pioneer prior to joining the faculty at UNC-Chapel Hill in 2000. Damania’s research focuses on oncogenic human viruses, Award. She is a Kavli Fellow of the National Academy of Sciences and a Komen Scholar. Curtis serves on multiple host-pathogen interactions and virus-associated cancers. scientific advisory boards and on the editorial board for journals spanning the fields of computational biology to precision oncology. For her work, Damania has received several honors including being named a V Scholar, an AACR Gertrude Elion Research Scholar, a Burroughs Welcome Investigator in the Pathogenesis of Infectious Disease, an American Heart Established Investigator and a Leukemia & Lymphoma Society Scholar. She is a Fellow of the American Academy of Microbiology and the American Association for the Advancement of Science. She also received the Dolph O. Adams award from the Society for Leukocyte Biology and was named a Kavli Fellow by the National Academy of Sciences, USA.

She serves on the National Cancer Institute (NCI) Board of Scientific Counselors. She has also served as a member for the congressionally mandated Report on Carcinogens Monograph by the National Toxicology Program and Secretary of the U.S. Dept. of Health and Human Services.

SPEAKERS 2021 V SCHOLAR SUMMIT SHANE JACOBSON THEODORE S. LAWRENCE, M.D., PH.D., FASTRO, FASCO Chief Executive Officer MEMBER OF THE V FOUNDATION’S SCIENTIFIC ADVISORY COMMITTEE THE V FOUNDATION Isadore Lampe Professor and Chair, Department Radiation Oncology UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN

Jacobson is the chief executive officer of the V Foundation for Cancer Research. He is an accomplished foundation Lawrence is the Isadore Lampe Professor and chair of the Department of Radiation Oncology. He is the director of executive with experience leading record-setting campaigns that align philanthropic partnerships with ambitious the Translational and Clinical Research Program of the University of Michigan’s Rogel Cancer Center. He has been goals. At the V Foundation, Jacobson and the staff have a laser-sharp focus on funding game-changing research elected to the Association of American Physicians (AAP) and the National Academy of Medicine (NAM). Lawrence is and all-star scientists to accelerate victory over cancer and save lives. an editor of the “Cancer Journal,” the associate editor of “Seminars in Radiation Oncology,” a senior editor for “Cancer Research” and a scientific editor for “Cancer Discovery.” He has been president of the American Society of Radiation Prior to joining the organization, Jacobson served as the president and CEO of the University of Vermont Foundation. Oncology (ASTRO), The Radiation Oncology Institute (ROI), and of the Society of Chairs of Radiation Oncology His team set an all-time high in fundraising through a highly successful $581 million campaign. Included in this total Programs (SCAROP), chair of the National Cancer Institute’s Board of Scientific Councilors and a member of the Board is nearly $300 million in support of academic medicine and patient care, as well as $43 million for athletics. They of Scientific Advisors, and a member of the Board of Directors of the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO), also generated substantial investments in research and scientific discovery by more than doubling the number and the founding Chair of the Radiation Sciences and Medicine Working Group of the American Association of Cancer of endowed faculty professorships and chairs, with more than 125 positions now at the university. Additionally, Research (AACR). For his accomplishments, he has been awarded the Gold Medal of ASTRO and of the Israeli Society Jacobson was part of a team that cultivated a $66 million gift that named UVM’s College of Medicine – which of Clinical Oncology, which are the highest awards conferred by those societies; an ASCO Statesman Award and the represents the single largest contribution ever to a public university in New England. Radiological Society of North America’s (RSNA) Outstanding Researcher Award.

A native of Iowa, Jacobson received his bachelor’s and master’s degrees from Iowa State University, and he completed Lawrence’s interests in the laboratory are focused on molecularly and immunologically targeted radiosensitizers. the Harvard University Management Development Program. He has served on numerous boards and committees, His clinical research combines these laboratory studies with conformal radiation guided by advanced imaging and including the Association of Governing Boards’ Council of Presidents and AGB Foundations Advisory Council and blood biomarkers for the treatment of patients with gastrointestinal and central nervous system malignancies. He is the UVM President’s Commission on Inclusive Excellence. the author of over 350 peer-reviewed publications, and his work has been continuously supported by the National Cancer Institute for over 25 years.

Lawrence joined the faculty of the University of Michigan in 1987, following a fellowship in medical oncology and a residency in radiation oncology at the National Cancer Institute. He received his research degree in cell biology from the Rockefeller University, followed by his medical degree from Cornell University and an internal medicine residency at Stanford University.

SPEAKERS 2021 V SCHOLAR SUMMIT WILLIAM G. NELSON, M.D., PH.D. CHAD PECOT, M.D. CHAIR, THE V FOUNDATION’S SCIENTIFIC ADVISORY COMMITTEE 2014 V SCHOLAR Marion I. Knott Professor of Oncology Associate Professor, Oncology Director UNC LINEBERGER COMPREHENSIVE CANCER CENTER AT CHAPEL HILL SIDNEY KIMMEL COMPREHENSIVE CANCER CENTER AT JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY Twitter: @ChadPecot Nelson is the Marion I. Knott Professor of Oncology and director of the Sidney Kimmel Comprehensive Cancer Pecot is an associate professor at the UNC Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center and specializes in solid Center at Johns Hopkins University. He currently holds professorships in oncology, medicine, pharmacology, tumor malignancies. As a prior cancer patient, his passion is to uncover important findings in cancer biology and pathology, radiation oncology, urology and environmental health sciences. His laboratory discovered one of the translate these to the clinic as rapidly as possible. Since August 2013, he has been an independent investigator at first epigenetically-silenced genes in human cancer, GSTP1, inactivated in nearly all prostate cancer cases. GSTP1 UNC-Chapel Hill. Pecot’s research career thus far has quickly led to several high-impact discoveries as a result of DNA methylation assays approved by the US Food and Drug Administration serve as adjuncts for prostate cancer innovative ideas and establishment of synergistic collaborative teams. He also has a passion for training the next diagnosis, the first epigenetic laboratory tests in common use. Nelson and colleagues also identified the major generation of scientists at the doctoral and postdoctoral level. His research is characterized by a harmonization precursor to prostate cancer – proliferative inflammatory atrophy. of therapeutic RNA interference, sophisticated modeling of cancer metastasis and the tumor microenvironment, and the integrative use of complex bioinformatic and systems biology approaches to uncover key nodes in cancer Outside of Johns Hopkins, Nelson has also become a recognized leader in cancer research, organizing national and networks. Because metastatic spread accounts for the greatest proportion of cancer-related deaths in the U.S. and international meetings in cancer health disparities, cancer prevention and prostate cancer, serving on the board of worldwide, most of Pecot’s current work uses lung and triple-negative breast cancers as disease models with the the V Foundation, as a scientific co-chair for Stand Up 2 Cancer, on the Scientific Advisory Board for the Prostate hopes that our discoveries will also fundamentally impact treatment paradigms in other aggressive malignancies. Cancer Foundation and as a co-chair of the National Cancer-Institute Translational Research Working Group and working as executive editor of “Cancer Today” and a senior editor of “Cancer Research.” Owner of seven issued patents, he is a co-founder of Digital Harmonics, a board member of Armis Biopharma and an advisory board member of Abbvie and of Proquest Investments.

SPEAKERS 2021 V SCHOLAR SUMMIT HOLLY ROWE KRIS C. WOOD, PH.D. Reporter 2013 V SCHOLAR ESPN Associate Professor, Department of Pharmacology and Cancer Biology DUKE UNIVERSITY Rowe celebrates more than 20 years as one of ESPN’s most versatile commentators. Covering a wide variety of Wood is an associate professor with tenure in the Department of Pharmacology and Cancer Biology at Duke sports for ESPN, Rowe joined the network full-time in August 1998 after appearing on select ESPN telecasts in 1997 University. He received his bachelor’s degree in chemical engineering from the University of Kentucky, where he and ABC Sports in 1995-96. Rowe is one of the lead reporters on ESPN’s “Saturday Night Prime College Football,” was recognized with the outstanding sophomore, junior and senior awards in chemical engineering, the Tau Beta “Big Monday.” and “Saturday Primetime” men’s college basketball, Women’s Final Four, Women’s College World Pi outstanding senior award in the college of engineering, and a Barry M. Goldwater scholarship in science and Series, NCAA Indoor and Beach Volleyball national championships and the WNBA. mathematics. He received his Ph.D. in chemical engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where he developed self-assembling polymeric systems for controlled gene and drug delivery under the supervision of Rowe has also provided play-by-play commentary for women’s college basketball, softball, volleyball and Professors Paula Hammond, Ph.D., and Robert Langer, Sc.D. As an NIH and Misrock Fund postdoctoral fellow in the gymnastics. In addition, Rowe has covered soccer, swimming, track and field and the Little League World Series of laboratory of David Sabatini, M.D., Ph.D., at the Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research and the Broad Institute baseball and softball for ESPN. Rowe has also provided play-by-play for women’s college basketball and women’s of Harvard and MIT, his work focused on the development of functional genomic tools to study the determinants of college volleyball for Fox Sports from 1993-2003. anticancer drug sensitivity.

Rowe has worked as a sports reporter and anchor for outlets in Salt Lake City including KSL Radio, Fox 13 TV, KBYU Wood’s lab at Duke, founded in 2012, focuses on two related themes: (1) identifying, mechanistically characterizing, TV, BYU Sports Network and KFNZ Radio. Emmy-nominated Rowe is a producer and writer of documentaries and and translating new, molecularly targeted therapeutic strategies for biomarker-defined cancer subtypes and (2) features that have aired on KBYU TV, ESPN and FOX 13 TV in Salt Lake City. defining rational strategies to control long-term tumor evolution. To power these studies, Woods’ team develops and adapts a range of new functional genomic technologies. The lab’s work has been recognized by early career awards She graduated from the University of Utah with a broadcast journalism degree. While at Utah, Rowe was a from the Ovarian Cancer Research Fund Alliance, the V Foundation, the Stewart Trust, the Forbeck Foundation, sportswriter for the Daily Utah Chronicle and the Davis County Clipper, and anchored the campus TV station news. the Whitehead Foundation and the NIH BIRCWH Program. It has also inspired the design of multiple ongoing clinical trials and the creation of three biotechnology companies: Celldom (Silicon Valley, CA), Tavros Therapeutics Currently in treatment for stage IV metastatic melanoma, Rowe has become a tireless advocate for cancer research (Durham, NC), and Element Genomics, now a wholly owned subsidiary of UCB Pharma (Brussels). and prevention. Outside of the lab, Wood and his wife Michelle are the proud and exhausted parents of Viviann (5), Alexandra (2) and Cameron (6 months).

SPEAKERS 2021 V SCHOLAR SUMMIT SCHOLARS

2021 V SCHOLAR SUMMIT

2021 V SCHOLAR SUMMIT MICHAEL BIRNBAUM, PH.D. Assistant Professor, Department of Biological Engineering MASSACHUSETTS INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY (MIT) [email protected]

Birnbaum obtained a bachelor’s degree in chemical and physical biology at Harvard University in 2008. He then moved to Stanford University, where he completed his Ph.D. in immunology in 2014. At Stanford, he worked in Professor K. Christopher Garcia’s laboratory, studying the molecular mechanisms of T cell receptor recognition, cross-reactivity and activation. He then conducted 2017 postdoctoral research in Professor Carla Shatz’s laboratory, studying novel roles for immune receptors expressed by neurons in neural development and neurodegenerative disease. Michael joined the Department of Biological Engineering at MIT in 2016 as an assistant professor. His laboratory studies T cell recognition and signaling, developing new methods to measure and manipulate immune responses in cancer, infection and autoimmunity. He has V SCHOLARS been recognized as a V Scholar, a Packard Fellow, a Pew-Stewart Scholar and the NIH Director’s New Innovator award.

2021 V SCHOLAR SUMMIT STEPHANIE CORREA, PH.D. FRANCINE GARRETT-BAKELMAN, M.D., PH.D. Assistant Professor, Department of Integrative Biology and Physiology Assistant Professor, Medicine and Biochemistry and Molecular Genetics JONSSON COMPREHENSIVE CANCER CENTER UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA AT LOS ANGELES UNIVERSITY OF VIRGINIA SCHOOL OF MEDICINE [email protected] [email protected]

Correa is an assistant professor in the Department of Integrative Biology and Physiology and a member of the Garrett-Bakelman is a physician scientist at the University of Virginia School of Medicine. She received a bachelor’s Jonsson Comprehensive Cancer Center at UCLA. Dr. Correa received her Ph.D. in neurobiology and behavior from degree in biochemistry from California State University, Fullerton, and an M.D. and Ph.D. in cell biology from the Cornell University, and she completed postdoctoral training in developmental genetics at Boston University and Albert Einstein College of Medicine of Yeshiva University. She then completed clinical specialty and sub-specialty molecular neuroendocrinology at UC San Francisco. Throughout her training, Correa has been funded by an NSF training in internal medicine and hematology and medical oncology at Weill Cornell Medicine. Her Ph.D. thesis Graduate Research Fellowship, a postdoctoral NRSA, an American Heart Association Fellowship, and an NIH K01 and postdoctoral at Weill Cornell Medicine have focused on the study of epigenomics in the immune system. She Mentored Scientist Career Development Award. The Correa Lab is currently funded by an R01 from NIA and an R21 is currently an assistant professor of medicine and of biochemistry and molecular genetics at the University of from NCI. Research in the Correa Lab aims to understand how changes in estrogen signaling, such as those that are Virginia School of Medicine. Her lab focuses on the study of disease pathogenesis in Acute Myeloid Leukemia (AML) associated with menopause or adjuvant endocrine therapies, can impact health and quality of life. The Correa Lab in high risk patients through computational biology and experimentation. Utilizing data from genomics assays, her focuses on estrogen-sensitive regions of the hypothalamus that regulate and maintain temperature and energy lab identifies potential tumor suppressors and oncogenes which are subjected to functional genomics experiments balance. Recent studies in mice have revealed specialized neuron populations that regulate physical activity, bone to assess for potential pathogenic contributions to disease. health, heat generation and heat dissipation. These neurons are excellent candidates for mediating some of the negative side effects experienced by people undergoing tamoxifen therapy for breast cancer. Studies funded by Her work has been recognized by institutional research awards from the departments of medicine at Weill Cornell the V Foundation show that mice undergoing tamoxifen treatment exhibit changes in temperature regulation. In Medicine and the University of Virginia. Her laboratory’s long term goal is to contribute to the understanding of addition, single cell RNA sequencing studies have identified tamoxifen-sensitive cells and gene expression pathways disease mechanisms in AML that will result in the identification of novel and effective therapeutic options for high that are associated with these thermoregulatory changes. Our ultimate goal is to identify potential targets for risk patients. mitigating the thermoregulatory side effects of tamoxifen therapy and ultimately improve quality of life in breast cancer patients and survivors.

2017 V SCHOLARS 2021 V SCHOLAR SUMMIT AMI S. BHATT, M.D., PH.D. Assistant Professor, Medicine and Genetics and Director for Global Oncology CENTER FOR INNOVATION IN GLOBAL HEALTH STANFORD UNIVERSITY [email protected]

Bhatt is a physician scientist with a strong interest in microbial genomics, metagenomics and global health. She received her M.D. and Ph.D. from the University of California, San Francisco. She then carried out her residency and fellowship training at Harvard’s Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, and she served as chief medical resident from 2010-2011. She joined the faculty of the Department of Medicine (divisions of hematology and blood and marrow transplantation) and Department of Genetics 2018 at Stanford University in 2014 after completing a post-doctoral fellowship focused on genomics at the Broad Institute of Harvard and MIT. Bhatt has received multiple awards for her academic scholarship, including the Chen Award of Excellence from the Human Genome Organisation (HUGO).

Her lab develops molecular and computational methods to investigate the intestinal microbiome, with a strong focus on: V SCHOLARS (a) developing methods to detect and follow microbes at the strain level through time and space, (b) detecting and understanding the contribution of mobile genetic elements to bacterial evolution and phenotypes, and (c) understanding how microbes use small proteins to communicate with one another and with the host.

2021 V SCHOLAR SUMMIT PAULA D. BOS, PH.D. SCOTT V. BRATMAN M.D., PH.D., FRCPC Assistant Professor, Department of Pathology Associate Professor, Radiation Oncology MASSEY CANCER CENTER VIRGINIA COMMONWEALTH UNIVERSITY UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO [email protected] [email protected]

Bos grew up in a small town in Argentina. She obtained a master’s degree in genetics from the National University of Bratman received his M.D. and Ph.D. from Columbia University in 2009, followed by postdoctoral research and Misiones and moved to the United States to pursue further training. She obtained her Ph.D. from Cornell University, clinical training at Stanford Cancer Institute. Since joining University of Toronto and the Princess Margaret Cancer working in the laboratory of Joan Massagué. During her graduate work, she developed xenograft models of breast Centre in 2014, he has served as staff radiation oncologist within the Wharton Head and Neck Centre and has led cancer metastasis to the brain, identified cancer cell genes required for brain colonization and contributed to the basic, translational and clinical research studies on head and neck cancer and circulating biomarkers. Bratman functional characterization of molecular mediators of dissemination to the lungs. Bos performed her postdoctoral has been awarded a V Scholar Grant and a Career Development Award from Conquer Cancer Foundation of studies in the laboratory of Sasha Rudensky at the Sloan Kettering Institute, where she utilized genetic models to ASCO, and he currently holds the Dr. Mariano Antonio Elia Chair in Head and Neck Cancer Research at University dissect the role of regulatory T (Treg) cells in breast cancer progression. Health Network.

She is currently an assistant professor in the department of pathology and member of the Massey Cancer Center Bratman’s research seeks to improve outcomes for patients with head and neck cancer. The Bratman Lab is at Virginia Commonwealth University. Her laboratory investigates tumor microenvironmental interactions that taking a bench-to-bedside approach to develop genomic tools for personalized use of radiotherapy. Novel promote breast cancer progression and metastasis, with a particular focus on the crosstalk between immune radiosensitizers are being investigated in preclinical models of squamous cell carcinoma. Another active area of and non-immune cells in the brain metastatic environment. She has been awarded grants from the METAvivor research is liquid biopsy technology for detecting the presence of cancer. Ongoing studies are focused on utilizing Foundation, institutional American Cancer Society, V Foundation and Susan G Komen Foundation to unravel the circulating cell-free DNA for early cancer detection, disease monitoring, and detection of minimal/molecular complex interactions taking place in the brain metastatic microenvironment. residual disease. The team is also studying the biology of cell-free DNA and its implications for cancer behavior.

2018 V SCHOLARS 2021 V SCHOLAR SUMMIT TERESA DAVOLI, PH.D. MICHAEL DEEL, M.D. Assistant Professor, Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Pharmacology Assistant Professor, Pediatrics NYU GROSSMAN SCHOOL OF MEDICINE DUKE UNIVERSITY SCHOOL OF MEDICINE [email protected] [email protected] Davoli obtained her Ph.D. in 2013 from The Rockefeller University working with Dr. Titia de Lange on studying how Deel is a clinician scientist in pediatric oncology at Duke University. He received his medical degree at telomere dysfunction promotes aneuploidy during tumorigenesis. During her postdoctoral training, she worked Marshall University and completed a clinical fellowship and postdoctoral training at Duke. For his research in with Dr. Stephen Elledge using genomics approaches to understand the consequences of cancer aneuploidy for rhabdomyosarcoma, Deel was awarded an Early Career Award by the American Society of Pediatric Hematology- tumor formation and for therapy response in cancer patients. In May 2018, Davoli started her lab at the Institute Oncology and has received a St. Baldrick’s Fellowship Award, a Doris Duke Charitable Foundation Award, a V for Systems Genetics at NYU School of Medicine in New York. Her lab uses functional genetics and computational Scholar Award, a Duke School of Medicine Strong Start Award, a Hyundai Hope Scholar Award and an NIH K12 approaches to study the causes and consequences of genomic instability in cancer. Davoli has received the Career Development Award. Weintraub Graduate Student award in 2013, and she was a Helen Hay Whitney Postdoctoral Scholar. Davoli was a V Foundation Scholar and was also awarded the Melanoma Research Alliance Young Investigator Award and the Deel’s research focuses on finding novel ways to target fusion-gene positive rhabdomyosarcoma. Fusion-positive Breast Cancer Alliance Young Investigator Award. rhabdomyosarcoma is among the most difficult to cure cancers of childhood and young adults. It is driven by balanced chromosomal translocations t(2;13) or t(1;13) resulting in PAX3/7-FOXO1 fusion oncoproteins. As Her lab focuses on dissecting the causes and consequences of chromosome gains and losses in solid tumors, inherently disordered transcription factors with no drug binding sites, PAX3/7-FOXO1 are currently not viable including colorectal cancer, breast cancer and melanoma. Davoli recently found that tumors with a high level of therapeutic targets. Using a variety of biochemical assays, cell culture and murine models, he is investigating the aneuploidy tend to be immune cold and to be refractory to immunotherapy. Her long-term goals are to decipher mechanisms of regulation of the transcriptional activity of these aberrant oncoproteins, as well as the mechanisms how aneuploidy can be utilized as a biomarker for therapy response and as a potential target for novel cancer that regulate cancer cell stemness and chemoresistance. His group recently identified co-activators that regulate treatments that take advantage of synthetic lethalities associated with the aneuploid state. PAX3-FOXO1 and are also key regulators of the cell cycle and chromatin remodeling. Ultimately, his goal is that these studies will inform novel therapeutic approaches to sarcomas driven by fusion-oncoproteins.

2018 V SCHOLARS 2021 V SCHOLAR SUMMIT COURTNEY DINARDO, M.D., MSCE MALACHI GRIFFITH, PH.D. V CLINICAL SCHOLAR Associate Professor, Medicine (oncology) Associate Professor, Department of Leukemia Associate Professor, Genetics THE UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS MD ANDERSON CANCER CENTER Assistant Director, McDonnell Genome Institute [email protected] WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY SCHOOL OF MEDICINE [email protected] DiNardo is an academic clinical researcher with a primary focus on individualized therapy and precision oncology Griffith completed a bachelor’s degree with honors in biochemistry and biology in 2002 at the University of for myeloid malignancies, including the optimal incorporation of genomics into standard risk assessments and Winnipeg, followed by additional formal training in computer science. He worked as a molecular biologist and then treatment algorithms, and the clinical evaluation of targeted therapeutics for molecularly-defined patient subgroups. as a computational biologist during 2003-2004 before beginning a Ph.D. in medical genetics and bioinformatics DiNardo has experience in designing, overseeing, and executing successful clinical trials; from Phase 1 dose-finding at the University of British Columbia under the mentorship of Dr. Marco Marra. He defended his Ph.D. thesis in studies to innovative investigator-initiated Phase II trials, to confirmatory randomized Phase III trials. DiNardo has December 2009 and joined Washington University School of Medicine in 2011, where he is currently an associate served an integral role in several highly influential trials involving IDH1, IDH2 and BCL2 inhibitors, which have led professor of medicine (oncology), associate professor of genetics and assistant director of the McDonnell Genome to the FDA approval of three therapies in AML since 2017 (the first-in-class IDH2 inhibitor enasidenib, the IDH1 Institute. Dr. Griffith now has more than 15 years of experience in the fields of genomics, bioinformatics, data mining inhibitor ivosidenib, and the BCL2 inhibitor venetoclax in combination with hypomethylating agents). and cancer research. He has published over 90 studies, received numerous research awards and honors and held several large grants including an NIH NHGRI K99/R00 Career Development Award, an NCI ITCR U01 award and a V Scholar Grant. He has mentored more than 50 bioinformatics trainees and taught more than 500 as an instructor for Cold Spring Harbor Laboratories and the Canadian Bioinformatics Workshops. Dr. Griffith’s research is focused on improving our understanding of cancer biology and the development of personalized medicine strategies for cancer using genomics and informatics technologies. Griffith’s lab has made substantial contributions to open source and open access resources for cancer research. Recently, the development of bioinformatics for immunogenomics has become a major focus of his lab.

2018 V SCHOLARS 2021 V SCHOLAR SUMMIT DANIEL “TREY” LEE, M.D. JAMIE SPANGLER, PH.D. Assistant Professor Assistant Professor, Biomedical Engineering Chemical & Biomolecular Engineering Director, Pediatric Hematopoietic Stem Cell Transplantation and Immunotherapy JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY SCHOOL OF MEDICINE UNIVERSITY OF VIRGINIA HEALTH [email protected] [email protected]

Lee is a pediatric hematologist/oncologist, assistant professor, and the director of Pediatric Hematopoietic Stem Cell Spangler earned a bachelor’s degree in biomedical engineering at Johns Hopkins University and went on to conduct Transplant (HSCT) and Immunotherapy at the University of Virginia (UVA). He studied at the University of Texas her Ph.D. research in biological engineering in Professor K. Dane Wittrup’s group at MIT, studying antibody- at Houston and MD Anderson Cancer Center for medical school, postdoctoral fellowship and pediatrics residency. mediated down-regulation of epidermal growth factor receptor as a new mechanism for cancer therapy. She He joined UVA in May 2016 after serving three years on faculty at the Pediatric Oncology Branch, NCI where, in then completed a postdoctoral fellowship in Professor K. Christopher Garcia’s lab in the molecular and cellular addition to Johns Hopkins University, he did his fellowship training. He is a physician-scientist and clinical trial expert, physiology and structural biology departments at Stanford University School of Medicine, focusing on engineering particularly in Chimeric Antigen Receptor (CAR) T-cell therapies. He developed and led one of the first CD19-CAR cytokine systems to bias immune homeostasis. Spangler launched her independent research group at Johns Hopkins T-cell trials in the world for children with leukemia/lymphoma and played an integral role in the development of University in July 2017, jointly between the departments of biomedical engineering and chemical and biomolecular the first-in-human CD22-CAR. He currently serves as global lead PI on the Phase I/II registration trial of KTE-X19 engineering. Her lab, located in the Translational Tissue Engineering Center at the School of Medicine, applies (Kite Pharma/Gilead). In collaboration with other investigators, Lee established the first definition, grading and structural and mechanistic insights to re-engineer existing proteins and design new proteins that therapeutically management standards for cytokine release syndrome (CRS), which was widely adopted internationally. He has modulate the immune response. In particular, her group is interested in engineering immune molecules such as since led a larger, international consensus effort for CAR toxicities, published a book serving as a practical guide for cytokines, growth factors, and antibodies for targeted treatment of diseases such as cancer and autoimmune CAR T-cell therapy, and published the first consensus guidelines for the management of CAR T-cell toxicities. He disorders. Spangler’s work has been recognized with several awards, including a V Scholar Award, an Emerson is currently building new HSCT and CAR T-cell programs at UVA, using his laboratory to design and develop new Collective Cancer Research Award, a Sanofi iAward, and an E. Matilda Ziegler Foundation for the Blind Award. She CARs and new toxicity-mitigating mechanisms before taking them into clinical trials. He successfully developed and was selected to deliver the 2020 Young Scientist Keynote at the Protein Engineering Summit and she was named patented a near-universal CAR targeting the integrin avB3 that has excellent preclinical activity in glioblastoma, the 2020 Maryland Outstanding Young Engineer. DIPG, rhabdomyosarcoma, melanoma, triple-negative breast cancer, among many others and is the subject of a Phase 1 clinical trial under development.

2018 V SCHOLARS 2021 V SCHOLAR SUMMIT SUMIT SUBUDHI, M.D., PH.D. V CLINICAL SCHOLAR Assistant Professor, Department of Genitourinary Medical Oncology THE UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS MD ANDERSON CANCER CENTER [email protected]

Subudhi is an assistant professor in the Department of Genitourinary Medical Oncology at The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center.

A trained medical oncologist and immunologist, his research focuses on investigating the immunological mechanisms responsible for tumor rejection and clinical benefit. He is the principal investigator of multiple immunotherapy clinical trials for patients with prostate cancer, and he conducts translational laboratory studies related to those trials. His research enables the development of novel immunotherapy strategies for the treatment of advanced prostate cancer.

He received the Prostate Cancer Foundation’s Young Investigator Award in 2014 and the V Foundation–Lloyd Family Clinical Oncology Scholar Award in 2017.

Subudhi holds a bachelor’s degree in biology basis of behavior from The University of Pennsylvania and an M.D. and Ph.D. from The University of Chicago.

2018 V SCHOLARS 2021 V SCHOLAR SUMMIT KERIANN “KERI” BACKUS, PH.D. Assistant Professor, Biological Chemistry and Chemistry and Biochemistry DAVID GEFFEN SCHOOL OF MEDICINE AT UCLA [email protected]

Backus received her Ph.D. in organic chemistry from the University of Oxford in 2012, supported by a Rhodes Scholarship and the NIH Oxford Cambridge Scholarship. She then completed a Postdoctoral Fellowship with Benjamin Cravatt at the Scripps Research Institute. Backus is currently an assistant professor of biological chemistry and chemistry and biochemistry at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA. She is the recipient of several recent awards, including a V Scholar Grant, Beckman Young Investigator Award, DARPA Young Faculty 2019 Award and Packard Fellowship. Backus’s research aims to revolutionize the use of mass spectrometry-based proteomics to decipher the functions and therapeutic accessibility of human proteins. As a postdoctoral fellow she developed small molecule chemoproteomic screening technology that expanded the scope of what proteins could be considered druggable. A major focus of Backus’s current research is the identification and chemical targeting of cancer-associated missense V SCHOLARS variants, using new proteogenomic methods. In unpublished studies, her lab has recently found that next generation sequencing data can be combined with the lab’s custom chemoproteomic methods to identify cysteine residues that are gained due to somatic mutations. Looking to the future, Backus hopes that her research will contribute to the production of new precision anti-cancer agents with clinical efficacy.

2021 V SCHOLAR SUMMIT PRATITI “MIMI” BANDOPADHAYAY, M.B.B.S., PH.D. YARUI DIAO, PH.D. Assistant Professor, Pediatrics Assistant Professor, Cell Biology HARVARD MEDICAL SCHOOL DUKE UNIVERSITY Associate Member [email protected] BROAD INSTITUTE OF MIT AND HARVARD [email protected]

Bandopadhayay is a pediatric neuro-oncologist and scientist within the Dana-Farber Diao received his Ph.D. in biochemistry from Hong Kong University of Science and Technology in 2011. His Ph.D. Cancer and Blood Disorders Center, assistant professor of pediatrics at Harvard Medical work is focused on the mechanism of myogenesis governing muscle regeneration and rhabdomyosarcoma School and an associate member of the Broad Institute. Mimi also serves as the director of development. For postdoc training, as a Human Frontier Science Program (HFSP) postdoc fellow, he joined Dr. Bing the Pediatric Low-Grade Glioma Program at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute. She and her Ren’s lab at UC San Diego to study gene regulation and chromatin sturcture. He spearheaded the effort to develop lab apply genomic approaches to identify and characterize oncogenic drivers of pediatric high-throughput CRISPR/Cas9 screen strategies that allow for genome-wide functional characterization of brain tumors and to determine the mechanisms through which brain tumors become non-coding regulatory sequence in the native chromatin context. He has also made a major contribution to map the resistant to therapies. long-range chromatin interactions in 27 human cell and primary tissue types. His previous work has published as first and co-first authored papers in MCB, PNAS, Cell Stem Cell, Dev Cell, Genome Research, Nature Methods and Nature Genetics, et al. After starting his own lab at Duke University, Diao has been continuing his effort to develop and deploy innovative genomics technologies to study gene regulation in muscle stem cell and rhabdomyosarcoma. He is the recipient of NIH Genome Innovator Awards, V Scholar Grant, Junior faculty awards from Glenn Foundation for Medical Research and American Federation of Aging Research and Whitehead scholar of Duke University.

2019 V SCHOLARS 2021 V SCHOLAR SUMMIT CHRISTIAN C. DIBBLE, PH.D. HECTOR L. FRANCO, PH.D. Assistant Professor, Department of Pathology Assistant Professor, Genetics BETH ISRAEL DEACONESS MEDICAL CENTER HARVARD MEDICAL SCHOOL LINEBERGER COMPREHENSIVE CANCER CENTER AT UNC CHAPEL HILL [email protected] [email protected]

Dibble earned his Ph.D. in molecular and cell biology with Dr. Brendan Manning at the Harvard School of Public Franco completed his bachelor’s degree in molecular biology from the Florida Institute of Technology while on an Health and trained as a postdoctoral fellow with Dr. Lewis Cantley and Dr. Alex Toker at Beth Israel Deaconess athletic scholarship to the university’s soccer team, and he received the NCAA’s Scholar Athlete award. He completed Medical Center and Harvard Medical School in Boston. He started his independent research lab at Beth Israel his Ph.D. in biochemistry from the University of Puerto Rico School of Medicine and furthered his training as a Deaconess Medical Center and Harvard Medical School at the end of 2017. Dibble has been awarded a K99/R00 postdoctoral fellow at the UT Southwestern Medical Center. Franco is currently an assistant professor in the Lineberger Pathway to Independence grant from the National Cancer Institute and a V Scholar Grant from the V Foundation. Comprehensive Cancer Center at UNC-Chapel Hill. His research on gene regulation in breast and ovarian cancers has been funded by a K99/R00 grant from the NCI, a Susan Komen Catalyst award, a DoD Breast Cancer Breakthrough Dibble studies how the oncogenes and tumor suppressors that drive tumor formation control metabolism, the Award, and the V Foundation V Scholar Grant, funded through the Stuart Scott Memorial Fund. cellular reactions that turn nutrients from food into energy and building blocks for cells and tissues. His lab discovered that the PI3K signaling pathway, which is mutated and activated in most cancers, drives production Franco’s project is aimed at understanding what makes ovarian cancer cells resistant to therapy by looking at the of Coenzyme A, a major metabolic cofactor that is required for central metabolism. They have also found that key non-coding regions of the genome. His lab uses state-of-the-art genome sequencing techniques to measure the metabolic enzymes that drive production of Coenzyme A undergo recurrent deep deletions in multiple cancers changes that occur in primary ovarian tumor samples compared to recurrent tumor samples collected from the including breast, lung and prostate. The Dibble lab is therefore exploring whether some cancer cells might be cancer hospital at UNC. The goal is to define how genes are being regulated in ovarian tumors in order to identify the especially dependent on continuous production of new Coenzyme A and specifically vulnerable to therapeutic molecular switches that are responsible for turning on genes that give rise to resistance. The hypothesis that these inhibition of this metabolic pathway. molecular switches (known as enhancers) are hijacked by the tumor cells for the activation of genes that give rise to resistance. Completion of this project will increase our knowledge about oncogenic enhancer function in ovarian cancer and highlight new avenues for therapeutic intervention.

2019 V SCHOLARS 2021 V SCHOLAR SUMMIT RICHARD FROCK, PH.D. GAVIN HA, PH.D. Assistant Professor, Radiation Oncology Assistant Professor, Computational Biology Program STANFORD CANCER INSTITUTE FRED HUTCHINSON CANCER RESEARCH CENTER [email protected] [email protected]

Frock received his Ph.D. in biochemistry from the University of Washington, Seattle, and he completed his Ha received his Ph.D. in bioinformatics from the University of British Columbia in 2014. While completing his postdoctoral training with Frederick Alt at Harvard Medical School/Boston Children’s Hospital. For his research Ph.D., he worked at the BC Cancer Agency under the supervision of Dr. Sohrab Shah and Dr. Sam Aparicio, where to map, in high-throughput, breakpoint junctions associated with chromosome translocations and other DNA he received the Lloyd Skarsgard Graduate Research Excellence Award for most outstanding Ph.D. research. double-strand break (DSB) repair anomalies as drivers of oncogenesis and genome instability, he has received a For his postdoctoral fellowship, Ha joined the laboratory of Dr. Matthew Meyerson at the Dana-Farber Cancer Career Development Award from the Radiation Research Foundation and is a V Scholar. Institute and the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard. Since Ha joined the faculty at Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, he has been awarded a V Scholar Grant, a Transition Career Development Award from the Frock is a co-developer of the original high-throughput genome-wide translocation sequencing (HTGTS) platform, National Cancer Institute/National Institute of Health and a Young Investigator Award from the Prostate Cancer where he subsequently led the development to improve the assay (LAM-HTGTS) to identify mechanisms that drive Foundation, among other awards. recurrent oncogenic translocations, off-target DSB activity programmed and engineered DSB sources, and how DSB repair pathway components can be leveraged to kill cancers. In this last regard, his group recently described Ha has extensive experience in the cancer genome analysis, with particular expertise in developing probabilistic an advance of the junction mapping technology, HTGTS-JoinT-seq (reJoining and Translocation sequencing), which and statistical methods for studying genomic alterations. He has developed machine learning algorithms, such as maps the repair fate of recurrent DSBs formed in non-dividing cells at single nucleotide resolution. Notably, this the software TITAN and ichorCNA, which are widely used within the cancer research community to analyze cancer collaborative work uncovered the existence of a bona fide alternative end-joining (A-EJ) pathway in G1-phase that genome sequencing data. His laboratory is focused on developing novel computational genomics and liquid biopsy is suppressed by classical nonhomologous end-joining (C-NHEJ) and a variant C-NHEJ pathway present only in approaches to study the genome structure of tumors in advanced prostate and other metastatic cancers. S/G2 cell cycle phase that uses the A-EJ Ligase1 when the C-NHEJ Ligase4 is absent. This model will be employed to identify putative synthetic-lethal drug targets for non-dividing cancer cells that do not die (e.g., palbociclib-treated breast cancers) and is relevant for targeting residual cancers that contribute to metastasis.

2019 V SCHOLARS 2021 V SCHOLAR SUMMIT SHANE HARDING, PH.D. RODNEY INFANTE, M.D., PH.D. Scientist and Assistant Professor Assistant Professor, Center for Human Nutrition PRINCESS MARGARET CANCER CENTER UT SOUTHWESTERN MEDICAL CENTER [email protected] [email protected]

Harding is a scientist at the Princess Margaret Cancer Centre, University Health Network and assistant professor in Infante obtained his M.D. and Ph.D. from UT Southwestern Medical Center in 2012. He completed his graduate and the Department of Medical Biophysics at the University of Toronto. Harding earned his Ph.D. in medical biophysics postdoctoral work under Nobel laureates Dr. Joseph Goldstein and Dr. Michael Brown. He completed his internal at the University of Toronto. He then went on to a postdoctoral fellowship at the University of Pennsylvania. Harding medicine residency (2012-2014) at Massachusetts General Hospital and his gastroenterology fellowship (2014-2017) opened his own Toronto laboratory in 2018. at UT Southwestern Medical Center. For his research in cancer cachexia, he has been awarded a V Scholar Grant, an American Gastroenterological Association Scholars Award, a Burroughs Wellcome Career Award for Medical DNA damage occurs as a consequence of normal cellular processes and from environmental exposures. Cellular Scientists, a Cancer Prevention and Research Institute of Texas Individual Investigator Award and an American changes that result from this damage contribute to the normal aging process and to the development of diseases, Cancer Society Research Scholar Grant. most notably cancer. To counteract this damage, cells have signaling pathways that sense and repair these lesions. Cancer treatments such as radiotherapy and some chemotherapeutics rely on delivering overwhelming DNA Infante has an interest in malignancies that cause cachexia, a wasting syndrome comprised of muscle loss, adipose damage to cause cell death. The major goals in the laboratory are to understand the contribution of DNA damage loss and anorexia. His lab focuses on the molecular mechanisms of cachexia using several in vitro and in vivo mouse and its cellular signaling to cancer, and to develop more effective methods for cancer therapy. cancer models. A major focus of the laboratory is to determine how these tumor-secreted molecules contribute to the development of tissue wasting and anorexia to identify potential therapeutic targets for this undertreated The lab is particularly focused on how the DNA damage response interacts with ongoing cellular processes. We are syndrome. These pathways are also upregulated in obesity influencing some of its comorbidities including non- exploring how the DNA damage response elicits changes in cellular physiology and genome organization that occur alcoholic fatty liver disease. Early findings from his laboratory have revealed that a Tumor-Adipose-Hypothalamic during cancer development and therapy. We are also focused on how radiotherapy can initiate cellular signaling Axis contributes to cancer cachexia. Tumor-secreted molecules induce JAK/STAT3-dependent adipose inflammation paradigms that influence patient responses to immunotherapy. In collaboration with our clinical colleagues, our aim increasing adipocyte lipolysis and altering cyto/adipokine serum levels ultimately influencing anorexia. is to take these studies in fundamental cell biology and use them to improve the treatment of cancer while reducing unwanted side-effects in patients.

2019 V SCHOLARS 2021 V SCHOLAR SUMMIT JIYEON KIM, PH.D. VINCENT LUCA, PH.D. Assistant Professor, Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Genetics Assistant Member UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS AT CHICAGO MOFFITT CANCER CENTER [email protected] [email protected]

Kim received her Ph.D. in molecular cancer biology from Duke University and completed her postdoctoral fellowship Luca received his Ph.D. in molecular biophysics from Washington University in St. Louis in 2012. He then conducted with Dr. Ralph DeBerardinis at UT-Southwestern Medical Center. For her research in metabolic vulnerabilities in his postdoctoral fellowship with Dr. K. Christopher Garcia at the Stanford University School of Medicine. Luca lung cancer, she has been awarded NCI K22 award, American Lung Association Lung Cancer Discovery Award, a V started his lab at Moffitt Cancer Center in 2017, where his research into receptor signaling mechanisms has led Scholar Grant, and Michael Reese Pioneer in Research Award. to his being awarded a Rita Allen Scholars Grant, a V Scholar Grant, and an R35 MIRA (Maximizing Investigators’ Research Award) from the National Institute of General Medicine. Kim studies mechanisms underlying the metabolic dependence of an especially aggressive form of human non- small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) harboring mutations in LKB1 and KRAS. During her postdoctoral training, Kim The Luca Lab integrates structural and synthetic biology to understand the molecular language of cell-to-cell uncovered an unexpected mechanism of nucleotide metabolism and metabolic liability in this subtype of lung cancer. communication. As a postdoctoral fellow, Luca developed engineering methods to capture and visualize interactions Stemming out of the postdoctoral work, her group is currently focusing on understanding how genetic alterations between components of the Notch pathway, a signaling system that plays key roles in tumor biology. These studies elicit metabolic dependencies and liabilities and how the interplay of carbon (glucose) and nitrogen (amino acid and laid the groundwork for his current studies of next-generation immune checkpoint receptors. Luca’s group nucleotide) metabolism contributes to tumor aggressiveness. Kim’s group has been actively applying metabolic is now using various biophysical methods to “see” how tumor cells and T cells interact at the atomic scale. The flux analysis to panels of lung cancer cell lines with various mutations to understand the full breadth of metabolic high-resolution molecular blueprints obtained through this work will then be used to guide the design of cancer diversity in cancer. These studies will be complemented by in vivo analyses of lung cancer metabolism in mice, and immunotherapies. Luca’s long-term goal is to develop these drugs into clinical candidates by taking advantage of by translational efforts designed to understand and exploit the metabolic idiosyncrasies of tumor cells. the translational research environment at Moffitt Cancer Center.

2019 V SCHOLARS 2021 V SCHOLAR SUMMIT SHRUTI NAIK, PH.D. FERDINANDO PUCCI, PH.D. Assistant Professor, Department of Pathology Assistant Professor, Otolaryngology, Head and Neck Surgery Assistant Professor, Department of Medicine Assistant Professor, Cell, Developmental and Cancer Biology Cancer Assistant Professor, Ronald O. Perelman Department of Dermatology Biology Graduate Program NYU GROSSMAN SCHOOL OF MEDICINE OREGON HEALTH & SCIENCE UNIVERSITY SCHOOL OF MEDICINE [email protected] [email protected] Naik received her Ph.D. from the University of Pennsylvania-National Institutes of Health Graduate Partnership Pucci received his international Ph.D. in molecular and cellular biology from San Raffaele University, Milan, Italy, Program and then pursued her postdoctoral studies as a Damon Runyon Cancer Research Fellow at the Rockefeller co-sponsored by Open University, UK. Pucci completed a post-doctoral fellowship in Mikael Pittet laboratory at University. For her research and advocacy, she has received numerous awards including the L’Oréal For Women Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston. For his research in tumor-host communication via extracellular vesicles, in Science Award, the Damon Runyon Cancer Foundation Dale F. Frey Award for Breakthrough Scientist, the Pucci was awarded a V Scholar Grant and a Cancer Research UK award. Blavatnik Award for Young Scientists, the International Takeda Innovators in Science Award, Pew Stewart Scholar, NIH Director’s New Innovator Award DP2, Packard Foundation Fellowship and the V Scholar Award. The Pucci Laboratory studies the role of extracellular vesicles as tumor antigen carriers and as senescence associated secretory component. During his training, Pucci pioneered the use of genetic reporters to track extracellular vesicles Naik studies the dynamic interactions between immune cells and epithelial stem cells to understand how this directly in vivo, from their native microenvironment. Bypassing any in vitro manipulation of these nanometer-sized conversation drives tissue regeneration and is hijacked in cancer. During her postdoctoral studies she uncovered vesicles is important to avoid the introduction of biases when in vivo studies are performed. These approaches led that stem cells maintain a memory of inflammation which enhances their regenerative capacity. Her group is now to the identification of a role for B cells and immunoglobulins in the immune response against tumors. The Pucci focused on understanding how inflammatory memory predisposes stem cells to cancer. laboratory is now developing in vivo models of cellular senescence to investigate the role of extracellular vesicles in senescence surveillance and immune evasion. In addition, we are following up on our studies of adaptive humoral responses by engineering model tumor antigens within extracellular vesicles and following antigen-specific B and T cell responses. Our overarching goal is to identify novel molecular and cellular switches that can be targeted for curative cancer therapy.

2019 V SCHOLARS 2021 V SCHOLAR SUMMIT VIVIANA RISCA, PH.D. ZACHARY SCHUG, PH.D. Assistant Professor and Head of the Laboratory of Genome Architecture and Dynamics Assistant Professor THE ROCKEFELLER UNIVERSITY THE WISTAR INSTITUTE [email protected] [email protected]

Risca is an assistant professor and head of the Laboratory of Genome Architecture and Dynamics at The Rockefeller Schug earned a Ph.D. in molecular cell biology from Thomas Jefferson University. In 2008, he began his University. Risca received her Ph.D. in biophysics from the University of California, Berkeley and then completed her postdoctoral studies at the Cancer Research UK Beatson Institute in Glasgow, U.K. with Professor Eyal Gottlieb. postdoctoral fellowship with Dr. William Greenleaf and Dr. Aaron Straight at Stanford University School of Medicine. He joined The Wistar Institute in 2016 as an assistant professor. For his research on cancer metabolism he has For her research in the three-dimensional organization of chromatin in both normal human cell types and in cancer, been awarded the NIH Director’s New Innovator Award, Susan G. Komen Career Catalyst Award and V Scholar she has received a V Scholar Grant and an Irma T. Hirschl/Monique Weill-Caulier Trust Career Scientist Award. Award, as well as grants from the W.W. Smith Charitable Trust, Pennsylvania Breast Cancer Coalition and Melanoma Research Foundation. Risca and her group study how the three-dimensional organization of chromatin, the protein-associated form of DNA, reflects and regulates DNA-based processes, with an emphasis on mechanisms of transcriptional regulation. The Schug Laboratory is interested in identifying and therapeutically targeting the metabolic changes that arise As a postdoctoral scholar at Stanford, Risca developed new technology for mapping sub-kilobase-scale chromatin during the development of cancer and metastasis. They combine cell biology, biochemistry, metabolomics, lipidomics folding using ionizing radiation and DNA sequencing. This approach makes it possible to probe the organization and transcriptomics to uncover novel metabolic vulnerabilities in cancer. These targets are then further developed of chromatin even in the densest regions of the nucleus, where chromatin is kept transcriptionally silent and is for use as effective therapeutic strategies for the improved treatment of cancer patients. For instance, his lab has protected from DNA damage through mechanisms that are still under active investigation by her group and others. recently focused on the role of acetate metabolism in cancer. They identified acetate as an important alternative She also developed methods for mapping RNA-DNA interactions in mammalian cells. Using these technologies nutrient source for cancer cells and discovered that the ACSS2 enzyme, which converts acetate into acetyl-CoA, in combination with computational modeling, the Risca Lab is now investigating how cellular state changes like is crucial for breast cancer growth. He has developed potent, selective ACSS2 inhibitors with the hope of applying entry into senescence caused by chemotherapy, remodels chromatin in different areas of the genome, and how these first-in-class compounds as a novel therapeutic approach to target acetate metabolism in cancer. specific components of chromatin that are frequently mutated or downregulated in cancer shape the genome’s three-dimensional organization.

2019 V SCHOLARS 2021 V SCHOLAR SUMMIT DAVID R. SOTO-PANTOJA, PH.D. ZUZANA TOTHOVA, M.D., PH.D. Assistant Professor, Hypertension Assistant Professor, Medicine Assistant Professor, Cancer Biology HARVARD MEDICAL SCHOOL Assistant Professor, Radiation Oncology [email protected] WAKE FOREST SCHOOL OF MEDICINE [email protected] Soto-Pantoja received his bachelor’s degree in biology from the University of Puerto Rico, Mayagüez Campus, and Tothova received her Ph.D. in genetics from Harvard University for her work on FoxO transcription factors in he received his Ph.D. in molecular genetics and genomics from Wake Forest School of Medicine. He received the self-renewal mechanisms of hematopoietic stem cells (HSC) in Dr. Gary Gilliland’s laboratory, and she received an Cancer Research Training Award to complete his post-doctoral research fellowship Laboratory of Pathology of M.D. from Harvard Medical School/MIT in the Health Sciences and Technology program. She completed residency the National Cancer Institute (NCI), where he devoted his efforts in understanding responses of ionizing radiation training in internal medicine at the Brigham and Women’s Hospital and fellowship training in adult hematology and in normal tissue injury as well as contributing to establishing CD47 as cancer immunotherapy target. After his oncology at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and MGH Cancer Center. Tothova carried out her postdoctoral work postdoctoral training, he received the NCI Transition Career Development Award-K22 and began his independent in Dr. Benjamin Ebert’s laboratory at the Broad Institute where she studied mechanisms of cohesin mutations in career as an assistant professor at Wake Forest University School of Medicine. The research in his lab focuses on myelodysplastic syndrome (MDS) and acute myeloid leukemia (AML), and where she also developed new models examining mechanism of immune cell metabolism to enhance responses to immunotherapy to prevent and treat of myeloid malignancies using multiplex CRISPR engineering of primary human HSC. She is a recipient of multiple aggressive cancers. He also studies off-target effects of cancer therapy in the cardiovascular system with the aim career development awards from the American Society of Hematology, Leukemia and Lymphoma Society, the at improving the quality of life of cancer patients. Soto-Pantoja’s research program serves as a platform to mentor Conquer Cancer Foundation, RUNX1 Foundation/Alex’s Lemonade Stand, Doris Duke Charitable Foundation, the students from diverse levels and backgrounds so they can continue to pursue careers in science. Burroughs Wellcome Fund, Evans MDS Foundation, the V Foundation and the National Institutes of Health.

Tothova’s laboratory focuses on investigation of the biology, genetics and treatment of myeloid malignancies, including the premalignant state of clonal hematopoiesis, MDS and AML. In particular, Tothova’s lab aims to contribute to our understanding of the mechanisms by which epigenetic regulators recurrently mutated in myeloid malignancies, including the cohesin complex, lead to HSC transformation with the goal to identify novel therapeutic targets that can be translated to true patient benefit in the future.

2019 V SCHOLARS 2021 V SCHOLAR SUMMIT VIVIAN WEISS, M.D., PH.D. WEIXING ZHAO, PH.D. Assistant Professor, Department of Pathology, Microbiology, and Immunology Assistant Professor, Biochemistry and Structural Biology VANDERBILT UNIVERSITY MEDICAL CENTER UT HEALTH, SAN ANTONIO [email protected] [email protected]

Weiss is currently an assistant professor in the Department of Pathology, Microbiology and Immunology at Zhao received his Ph.D. in plant molecular and development biology from Peking University, China, and he Vanderbilt University Medical Center. Weiss attended Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, MD, to obtain her M.D. completed his postdoctoral fellowship with Dr. Patrick Sung at Yale University. For his research in genetic control of and Ph.D. in immunology. During her Ph.D. training, Weiss received the American Association for Cancer Research heterocyst differentiation nitrogen fixation in cyanobacteria (blue-green algae) during Ph.D., he has been awarded Pre-doctoral Fellowship Award for her work in tumor immunology under the mentorship of Dr. Elizabeth Jaffee. two national awards from the P.R.C., a First-Class Natural Science Award from the Ministry of Education and a After completing this training, she began the Vanderbilt University Pathology Residency Training Program for Second-Class National Award for Natural Science. For his research in DNA repair and BRCA1/2 cancer biology, he anatomic and clinical pathology, followed by a fellowship in cytopathology at Vanderbilt University Medical Center. has been awarded Basser Innovation Award from Basser Center for BRCA at Penn Medicine’s Abramson Cancer, She is board certified in anatomic pathology, clinical pathology and cytopathology. Her clinical practice focuses Rising STARs Award from The University of Texas System, V Scholar Award from the V Foundation and Voelcker on diagnosis of fine needle aspirations, particularly of the thyroid. She was the 2017 recipient of the American Young Investigator Award from Max and Minnie Tomerlin Voelcker Fund. Society of Cytopathology Young Investigator Award for her work on the molecular and immunologic mechanisms of thyroid cancer. Weiss’s translational research laboratory focuses on characterizing the molecular alterations Zhao studies mechanisms underpinnings of the chromosome damage repair pathway that depends on tumor and tumor microenvironment of pediatric and adult thyroid cancer in order to improve the current diagnostic suppressors BRCA1 and BRCA2. During his postdoctoral training, Zhao developed robust and first systems to algorithms and therapy for this disease. isolate large quantities of highly purified, monodispersed BRCA2 and BRCA1 complexes for mechanistic studies. Now, his current laboratory is uniquely well positioned to leverage their expertise in biochemical reconstitution of complex reactions and cellular assays for deciphering the BRCA1/2 tumor suppressor networks. These projects will provide actionable information to evaluate the pathogenicity of BRCA1/2 mutations, to explain the basis of innate and acquired drug resistance and will identify targets for the development of new cancer therapeutics.

2019 V SCHOLARS 2021 V SCHOLAR SUMMIT ALICE BERTAINA, M.D., PH.D. V CLINICAL SCHOLAR Inpatient Medical Director, Section Chief, Stem Cell Transplantation and Regenerative Medicine STANFORD SCHOOL OF MEDICINE AND LUCILE PACKARD CHILDREN’S HOSPITAL Co-Director BASS CENTER FOR CHILDHOOD CANCER AND BLOOD DISEASE [email protected] 2020 Bertaina received her M.D. and Ph.D. from the Universities of Pavia and Tor Vergata, respectively. She is an expert in allogeneic hematopoietic stem and progenitor cell transplant (HSCT) for pediatric patients affected by hematological malignancies or non-malignant disorders. At Stanford School of Medicine and Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital, she is inpatient medical director, section chief of Stem Cell Transplantation and Regenerative Medicine and co-director of Bass Center for Childhood Cancer and Blood Disease. Prior to this, she was the head of the Stem Cell Transplant Unit of the Bambino Gesù Children’s Hospital in Italy, which performs HSC transplants V SCHOLARS on the largest number of children in Europe (around 150 patients/year). In 2010, Bertaina developed an innovative graft manipulation approach, with the goal of broadening HSCT access to all patients, including those that lack a suitable donor. By depleting haploidentical HSCT of ab T cells and CD19+ B-cells (abhaplo-HSCT), Bertaina has successfully transplanted hundreds of pediatric patients and obtained 70% leukemia-free survival at 5 years. This pioneering strategy is a major milestone in haploidentical transplant, and it has ensured that children without a matched donor can now be cured. Her goal is to further improve leukemia-free survival in these abhaplo-HSCT recipients. To this goal, she is investigating how to engineer gd T cells to promote graft-versus-leukemia after HSCT. In addition, Bertaina is investigating causes of pediatric acute leukemia, in particular the rare and highly aggressive juvenile myelomonocytic leukemia (JMML), focusing on understanding the epigenetic mechanisms underlying the disease.

2021 V SCHOLAR SUMMIT MARIANA BYNDLOSS, D.V.M., PH.D. ABHISHEK A. CHAKRABORTY, PH.D. Assistant Professor, Pathology, Microbiology and Immunology Assistant Professor, Lerner Research Institute VANDERBILT UNIVERSITY MEDICAL CENTER CLEVELAND CLINIC [email protected] [email protected]

Byndloss received her D.V.M. and a Ph.D. from Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais in Brazil, receiving the Chakraborty did early training in India and completed his Ph.D. in Dr. William Tansey’s laboratory at Cold Spring CAPES Thesis Award for best Ph.D. thesis in Veterinary Medicine in Brazil in 2014. After completing her Harbor Laboratory, where he studied the importance of c-Myc signaling and proteolysis in blood-borne cancers. postdoctoral fellowship at the University of California, Davis, Mariana started her lab in the Department of For his post-doctoral training, he moved to Boston and trained under Dr. William Kaelin at the Dana-Farber Cancer Pathology, Microbiology and Immunology at Vanderbilt University Medical Center in 2018. Her research aims at Institute, where he studied the importance of oxygen-sensing pathways as regulators of oncogenesis, particularly understanding how inflammation-mediated changes in gut epithelial metabolism, gut dysbiosis, and increased risk in kidney cancer. His work is supported by several pilot awards from the Case Comprehensive Cancer Center, a DOD of noncommunicable diseases, including obesity-associated colon cancer. Byndloss has been awarded the 2020 Early Career Investigator award and the V Scholar Award. NOSTER Science Microbiome Prize (runner-up), the BSF Bergmann Memorial Research Award, the Vanderbilt Digestive Disease Center Young Investigator Award, and a V Scholar Grant. Chakraborty’s laboratory studies the importance of epigenetic changes that occur due to dysfunctional pVHL/HIF function in kidney cancer, but also due to physiological changes in oxygen. In this regard, he is interested in studying the oxygen- and 2-oxo-glutarate dependent (dioxygenase) enzymes, such as the JumonjiC-family histone demethylases (KDMs). His work on dysfunctional KDMs in kidney cancer, for example, established the importance of the histone methyltransferase EZH1. But, more broadly, he has defined the relevance of certain KDMs as cellular oxygen sensors. Dr. Chakraborty’s laboratory is now performing epigenetic studies, unbiased genetic screens, and functional validation studies to address how the epigenetic changes in kidney cancer control important oncogenes. By addressing the role of these dysregulated (onco)genes, Chakraborty’s laboratory hopes to identify new therapeutic targets in kidney cancer.

2020 V SCHOLARS 2021 V SCHOLAR SUMMIT AADEL CHAUDHURI, M.D., PH.D. SHIN-HENG CHIOU, PH.D. Assistant Professor, Radiation Oncology, Genetics and Computer Science Assistant Professor, Department of Medicine WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY SITEMAN CANCER CENTER RUTGERS CANCER INSTITUTE OF NEW JERSEY [email protected] [email protected]

Chaudhuri is an assistant professor of radiation oncology, genetics, and computer science and engineering at Chiou received his Ph.D. in immunology from Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, TX. He then went on to Washington University in St. Louis. He is a physician-scientist and sees patients one day a week at the Siteman Stanford University for his postdoctoral training in both pancreatic cancer research and T cell biology. Chiou has Cancer Center. Chaudhuri completed his M.D. at Stanford, Ph.D. at Caltech, and bachelors’ degrees in biology and been awarded the Dean’s postdoctoral fellowship at Stanford, the Anderman pancreatic cancer research fellowship, computer science at MIT. He completed his Ph.D. in biology under the mentorship of Dr. David Baltimore, focusing and a V Scholar Grant for his research in pancreatic cancer. on microRNAs in hematological diseases, and he completed his residency at Stanford University, where he did postdoctoral work with Dr. Maximilian Diehn and Dr. Ash Alizadeh, demonstrating that circulating cell-free tumor Chiou studies the T cell specificities in solid cancers. As a postdoc, he pioneered a computational method for the DNA (ctDNA) can serve as a biomarker for molecular residual disease (MRD) after curative-intent lung cancer inference of T cell specificity in human lung cancer. This platform allowed him to establish a global picture of the treatment (Chaudhuri et al, Cancer Discovery, 2017). T cell specificity landscape using the T cell receptor repertoire and HLA genotypes from patients and discover disease-relevant T cell clonotypes. Once uncovered the candidate T cell clones, his group is able to identify the Chaudhuri has received multiple major research awards including the American Society of Clinical Oncology Young cognate antigens by using an HLA display library. In pancreatic cancer, his group is currently searching for T Investigator Award, the Radiological Society of North America Roentgen Research Award, the NCI K08 Career cell specificities that are enriched in long-term survivors. A deeper understanding of the T cell function in long- Development Award and the V Scholar Award. He was the chairperson for the 2018 American Association for Cancer term survivors, including the antigen specificities, will greatly impact our ability to invent more efficacious Research annual meeting educational session titled “NGS Methods for Disease Monitoring.” His laboratory focuses T cell-based therapies to treat pancreatic cancer patients. In addition, Chiou’s group has previously developed on the development and application of ctDNA technologies for early cancer therapeutic response assessment and a unique pancreatic cancer mouse model by combining the CRISPR technology with a surgical procedure that MRD detection. His group recently published an article in JCO Precision Oncology (Pellini et al, JCO PO, 2021), where enabled genetic perturbation within somatic pancreatic cells. Thus, his group also focuses on understanding the they showed that ctDNA MRD can be detected after neoadjuvant chemotherapy for oligometastatic colorectal mechanism of pancreatic cancer progression by using the genetically-engineered mouse models. cancer, and that urine-mediated ctDNA detection for this non-genitourinary malignancy is also feasible.

2020 V SCHOLARS 2021 V SCHOLAR SUMMIT BENJAMIN IZAR, M.D., PH.D. GENEVIEVE C. KENDALL, PH.D. Assistant Professor, Medicine Principal Investigator, Center for Childhood Cancer and Blood Diseases COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY HERBERT IRVING COMPREHENSIVE CANCER CENTER NATIONWIDE CHILDREN’S HOSPITAL [email protected] Assistant Professor, Department of Pediatrics THE OHIO STATE UNIVERSITY COLLEGE OF MEDICINE [email protected]

Izar is a physician-scientist who completed his graduate training at the Justus Liebig University Giessen, Germany, Kendall is a principal investigator in the Center for Childhood Cancer and Blood Diseases at Nationwide Children’s internal medicine residency at Massachusetts General Hospital and medical oncology fellowship at Beth Israel Hospital and an assistant professor in the Department of Pediatrics at The Ohio State University College of Deaconess Medical Center. He completed a postdoctoral fellowship with Dr. Levi Garraway and subsequently with Medicine. Kendall received her Ph.D. in molecular biology at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), before Drs. Aviv Regev and Kai Wucherpfennig at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and the Broad Institute. He is specialized performing her postdoctoral studies focused on pediatric oncology with Dr. James Amatruda at UT Southwestern in clinical melanoma care and leads a translational research program at Columbia University. He received several Medical Center. For her work focused on fusion-driven pediatric sarcomas she has been awarded the AACR- awards, including a NCI K08 mentored research award and the Burroughs Wellcome Fund Career Award for QuadW Fellowship in Clinical/Translational Sarcoma Research, an Alex’s Lemonade Stand Foundation Young Medical Scientists. Investigator Grant, a Hartwell Foundation Postdoctoral Fellowship, a V Scholar Grant, and an Alex’s Lemonade Stand Foundation “A” Award. His research focuses on understanding resistance to immunotherapies and how different metastatic niches form and influence drug responses. During his training, Izar developed expertise in single-cell genomics and genome editing Kendall’s research is focused on developing basic and translational models of pediatric sarcomas—devastating and in patient and mouse models to study cancer immunotherapies. In recent work, his group identified dependencies aggressive solid tumors with limited therapeutic options. Specifically, her group studies fusion-oncogene driven that drive metastasis to the liver niche, and how the presence of these lesions impair local and peripheral immune rhabdomyosarcoma using cell culture and transgenic zebrafish systems to delineate the underlying biology of the responses. In the future, Izar will delineate various microenvironmental cues that determine the liver and brain disease and then apply that knowledge to identify novel molecular targets. Kendall’s ultimate goal is to apply her metastatic niches, and develop novel drug therapies to overcome resistance to immunotherapies. models as discovery based tools to derive mechanistic insights for improving outcomes for children with cancer.

2020 V SCHOLARS 2021 V SCHOLAR SUMMIT SAM MCBRAYER, PH.D. ADAM PALMER, PH.D. Assistant Professor Assistant Professor, Pharmacology CHILDREN’S RESEARCH INSTITUTE UT SOUTHWESTERN MEDICAL CENTER UNIVERSITY OF NORTH CAROLINA AT CHAPEL HILL / LINEBERGER COMPREHENSIVE CANCER CENTER [email protected] [email protected]

McBrayer received his bachelor’s degree in biochemistry from Baylor University. He obtained his Ph.D. in cancer Palmer is an assistant professor in the Department of Pharmacology at the University of North Carolina at Chapel biology at Northwestern University’s Feinberg School of Medicine, working under the mentorship of Dr. Steven Rosen. Hill, where he is a member of the Computational Medicine Program and the UNC Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer McBrayer then completed a fellowship in the laboratory of Dr. William G. Kaelin, Jr. at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute Center. Previously Adam received his bachelor’s degree in biochemistry, chemistry, and physics from the University and Harvard Medical School as an American Cancer Society Postdoctoral Fellow. McBrayer is now an assistant of Adelaide, Australia; his Ph.D. in systems biology from Harvard University for research on antibiotic resistance professor in the Children’s Research Institute at UT Southwestern Medical Center. He is a CPRIT Scholar in Cancer with Professor Roy Kishony; and Palmer trained as a postdoctoral fellow in systems pharmacology with Professor Research and has received an NCI Transition Career Development Award and an Abeloff V Scholar Award. Peter Sorger at Harvard Medical School.

McBrayer’s laboratory seeks to understand how metabolic changes in tumor cells drive cancer initiation, promote The Palmer Laboratory applies experiments, computation, and theory to understand the mechanisms of clinically adaptation to stress and create opportunities for therapy. To do so, the lab predominantly studies the biology successful combinations of cancer therapies. Particular interests are the clinical implications of inter-patient and of pediatric and adult brain tumors driven by mutations in genes that regulate metabolism. By studying these intra-tumor heterogeneity, curative regimens for aggressive lymphomas, and predicting the activity of novel drug mutations, McBrayer hopes to understand how alterations in metabolism control cell fate and function. These combinations. Recently, Adam has devised a computational method that accurately predicted the efficacy in clinical insights hold promise for the development of new therapies for patients with brain tumors and, by extension, for trials of nearly all FDA-approved combinations of Immune Checkpoint Inhibitors with other forms of cancer therapy. those with other types of cancer.

2020 V SCHOLARS 2021 V SCHOLAR SUMMIT JUSTIN PERRY, PH.D., M.A. STEFANI SPRANGER, PH.D. Assistant Member, Immunology Program Assistant Professor, Biology Assistant Professor, Immunology and Microbial Pathogenesis MASSACHUSETTS INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY (MIT) MEMORIAL SLOAN KETTERING CANCER CENTER / WEILL CORNELL MEDICAL CENTER [email protected] [email protected]

Perry is an assistant member in the immunology program of the Sloan Kettering Institute (SKI) at Memorial Sloan Spranger received her bachelor’s and master’s degrees from the Ludwig-Maximilians University in Munich Kettering Cancer Center and an assistant professor in Immunology and Microbial Pathogenesis at Weill Cornell and continued her doctoral work there under Professor Dolores J. Schendel at the Helmholtz-Zentrum Munich, Medical Center. Perry first obtained a master’s degree in clinical psychology, followed by a Ph.D. in immunology from Institute for Molecular Immunology, receiving her Ph.D. in 2011. She completed her postdoctoral training at the Washington University in St. Louis. He then went on to complete a postdoctoral fellowship with Dr. Kodi Ravichandran at University of Chicago in the laboratory of Professor Thomas F. Gajewski. During this period, she was supported by the University of Virginia. For his work at SKI, Perry has been awarded the Parker Institute for Cancer Immunotherapy the German Research Foundation postdoctoral fellowship and subsequently received the Irvington postdoctoral Career Development Award, a V Scholar Grant and a NIH NCI Pathway to Independence Award. fellowship awarded by the Cancer Research Institute. In 2017, she joined the Koch Institute for Integrative Cancer Research and the department of biology at MIT as an assistant professor. She is a Forbeck scholar. The lab’s Perry’s research broadly focuses on understanding mechanisms underlying ‘healthy’ clearance of dying cells, primary interest is in understanding the underlying mechanisms of the interactions between tumor and immune known as efferocytosis. During his postdoctoral training, he explored unanswered basic fundamental questions on cells, with the goal to understand mechanisms of immune evasion and develop therapies allowing more patients the process of efferocytosis. He demonstrated that during efferocytosis, phagocytes utilize an array of solute carrier to benefit from immunotherapy. (SLC) transporters and coordinately regulate SLC usage to perform multiple interconnected physiological functions, including glucose uptake/aerobic glycolysis and lactate secretion/establishment of an anti-inflammatory milieu. The Perry Lab combines techniques from immunology, cell biology, metabolism, and informatics to address how phagocytes, such as macrophages, handle the immense burden of efferocytosis. In particular, the lab studies how a phagocyte manages the massive influx of biological material in extreme environments such as that experienced in cancer, how this relates to host immune function and homeostasis and how these processes are exploited in cancer development and progression.

2020 V SCHOLARS 2021 V SCHOLAR SUMMIT RAMON SUN, PH.D. TUOQI WU, PH.D. Assistant Professor, Neuroscience Assistant Professor UNIVERSITY OF KENTUCKY COLLEGE OF MEDICINE UNIVERSITY OF COLORADO SCHOOL OF MEDICINE [email protected] [email protected]

Sun received his Ph.D. in biochemistry and molecular biology from the Australian National University, Australia, Wu received his Ph.D. from Emory University under the supervision of Dr. Rafi Ahmed and completed his and he completed his postdoctoral fellowship with Dr. Nicholas Denko at Stanford University. For his research in postdoctoral fellowship with Dr. Pamela Schwartzberg at the National Institutes of Health. For his research in complex carbohydrate metabolism in neoplastic diseases, he was awarded the Rally Foundation Award, a V Scholar stem-like CD8 T cells, he was awarded with a V Scholar Grant and a K99/R00 Pathway to Independence Award. Grant, St Baldricks Career Development Award and a recently funded NIH-R01. He is currently an assistant professor at the University of Colorado School of Medicine.

The primary research goal of the Sun Lab is to elucidate signaling pathways that modulate complex carbohydrate Wu’s research focuses on understanding the molecular pathways that govern T cell differentiation and function metabolism and how they are connected to cellular and organismal physiology in neoplastic diseases. To date, the during cancer and infection. His recent studies have revealed the transcriptional, epigenetic, and cytokine pathways Sun Lab has developed a number of new mass spectrometry-based methodologies to profile complex carbohydrate that regulate a novel stem-like T cell population with superior antitumor potency. Using a novel mouse model of molecules with single cell sensitivity and fine spatial resolution to assess microenvironmental influences using CAR T-cell therapy, he is evaluating whether CAR T cells can be programmed to acquire the characteristics of in-house instruments. Sun is in a unique position to formulate scientific hypotheses based on these data-rich stem-like T cells and induce effective long-term antitumor immunity. Wu’s long-term goal is to develop next- workflows, then test these hypotheses using transdisciplinary techniques in relevant genetic modified cell line generation cell-based immunotherapies that are able to induce durable remission from pediatric cancers. and mouse models. For example, in a recent study published in “Cell Metabolism,” the Sun Lab reports nuclear glycogen accumulation as a clinical feature of human non-small cell lung cancers and a critical driver of histone hypoacetylation during tumorigenesis. Recently, Sun discovered aberrant glycogen accumulation as a clinical hallmark of Ewing’s sarcoma; the Sun Lab is working to uncover the etiology of aberrant glycogen in driving Ewing’s sarcoma tumorigenesis and evaluating pharmacological clearance of aberrant glycogen as a therapeutic strategy.

2020 V SCHOLARS 2021 V SCHOLAR SUMMIT TIMOTHY YAP, M.D., PH.D. V CLINICAL SCHOLAR Medical Oncology Physician-Scientist and Tenure-Track Associate Professor, Departments of Investigational Cancer Therapeutics (Phase I Program) and Thoracic/Head and Neck Medical Oncology | Associate Director of Translational Research in the Institute for Personalized Cancer Therapy UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS MD ANDERSON CANCER CENTER Medical Director INSTITUTE FOR APPLIED CANCER SCIENCE [email protected]

Yap is a medical oncology physician-scientist and a tenure-track associate professor in the Department of Investigational Cancer Therapeutics (Phase I Program) and Department of Thoracic/Head and Neck Medical Oncology at the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center (MDACC). He is also the medical director of the Institute for Applied Cancer Science and associate director of translational research in the Institute for Personalized Cancer Therapy at MDACC.

Yap joined the Faculty at MDACC in 2016 from the Royal Marsden Hospital and The Institute of Cancer Research (London, England), where he was a National Institute for Health Research Biomedical Research Centre Clinician-Scientist in Medical Oncology. He was on the Faculty of the Phase I Drug Development Unit and Lung Cancer Unit, where he also led the Cancer Biomarkers Laboratory involved with the development of cfDNA and CTCs.

Yap’s main interests include the design and conduct of hypothesis-testing, biomarker-driven clinical trials ranging from first-in-human phase I studies to phase II tumor-agnostic multi-genotype basket trials, which incorporate detailed tumor molecular profiling studies, as well as the assessment of circulating tumor DNA (ctDNA) as predictive biomarkers of response for novel targeted agents and immunotherapies in clinical trials. His main therapeutic interests include the targeting of the DNA damage response (DDR) with novel therapeutics, such as ATR, PARP and DNA-PK inhibitors, as well as the development of novel PD-1/PD-L1 combinations with agents targeting ICOS, TGF-beta, PI3K/AKT, TIM-3, STING, Adenosine A2AR, LAG-3 and CDK2/4/6.

2020 V SCHOLARS 2021 V SCHOLAR SUMMIT