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Awards & Honors

Awards Archive 2015-2023

November 2023

George Goshua, MD, MSc, is a finalist for the NOMIS & Science Young Explorer Award, for his essay published in Science, “Napkin math can change the world,” on uncovering how mathematical models hold the key to equitable patient care.

Maryam Lustberg, MD, MPH, has been appointed as the faculty representative for Yale Cancer Center to the Yale School of Medicine Dean’s Faculty Advisory Council from November, 2023 to October, 2026. In addition, Dr. Lustberg presented at the Clinique d’Oncologie Conference in Morocco last week.

Barbara Burtness, MD, presented the keynote address at the International Academy of Oral Oncology in Incheon, Korea last week.

Alexander Pine, MD, and Anish Sharda, MD, PhD, are senior authors of an abstract presented at American College of Rheumatology Convergence 2023 last week on "Plasma Proteomic Profiling in Antiphospholipid Antibody-positive Patients with Different Clinical Phenotypes: Results from the Antiphospholipid Syndrome Alliance for Clinical Trials and International Networking (APS ACTION) Registry."

The Center for Community Engagement and Health Equity (CEHE) presented at the American Public Health Association annual meeting in Atlanta earlier this week on “A mixed message investigation of multilevel influences on diverse participation in early phase cancer clinical trials.” Authors of the abstract included: Jessica Lewis, PhD, LMFT, Amy Smoyer (Southern CT State U), Erin Singleton, MPH, Marcella Nunez-Smith, MD, MHS, and Patricia LoRusso, DO.

Jessica Lewis, PhD, LMFT, Deputy Director of CEHE, presented at a conference in New York City on sexual orientation and gender identity data collection to improve cancer health equity last month on "The Science of Cancer Health Equity in Sexual and Gender Minority Communities.“ Co-authors on the presentation included Karen Wang, MD, MHS, Marcella Nunez-Smith, MD, MHS, Hill Wolfe, PhD, MPA, and Ash Alpert, MD.

Sakinah Carter Suttiratana, PhD, MPH, MBA, Co-Director of CEHE and Associate Research Scientist in Internal Medicine, presented at the Cancer Center Community Impact Forum.

Yang Yang-Hartwich, PhD, has been awarded a Scholar Award from the American Cancer Society to fund her grant, “MiPEP133, a New Tumor Suppressor for Ovarian Cancer.” Dr. Yang-Hartwich will work in collaboration with Alessandro Santin, MD, to investigate the biological activities of miPEP133 and study how it can improve effectiveness of treatment for ovarian cancer.

Patricia LoRusso, DO, will present the 2023 Director’s Lecture at Manchester Cancer Research Centre today on “The Future of Developmental Therapeutics in Oncology.”

Gabriela Spilberg, MD, will present at the 2024 ProsTIC Preceptorship on “Precision Oncology in Practice” in Melbourne, Australia in March.

Dr. Lei Zhang, a postdoctoral associate in the laboratory of Xiaoyong Yang, PhD, has been honored with the 2023 Postdoctoral Fellowship from the American Cancer Society. This prestigious award will serve as a catalyst for Dr. Zhang's ongoing research endeavor, delving into the intricate molecular intricacies and therapeutic prospects of fatty liver-associated liver cancer.

Kiran Turaga, MD, MPH, will moderate and present during today’s virtual Appendix Cancer Pseudomyxoma Peritonei (ACPMP) Symposium.

October 2023

Susan J. Baserga, MD, PhD, MPhil and Emily Ai-hua Wang, MD, MAS, have been elected to the National Academy of Medicine (NAM).

Tara Sanft, MD, presented in a panel at the Cancer Survivorship Summit, a special event hosted by U.S. Representative from Florida and breast cancer survivor, Debbie Wasserman Schultz. Dr. Sanft joined First Lady, Dr. Jill Biden, who was the Keynote Speaker, as well as Katie Couric and Martina Navratilova as one of many notable guest speakers at the Summit.

Amer Zeidan, MBBS, co-chaired the first meeting of the Society of Hematologic Oncology-Middle East and North Africa Chapter (SOHO_MENA) held at the Lebanese National Library in Beirut, Lebanon September 28-29 and gave two talks about AML and MDS. Dr. Zeidan also co-chaired the second meeting of Controversies in MDS AND AML (COMydAL) of the International Academy for Clinical Hematology (IACH) in Paris, France last week and also presented on MDS and AML.

Qin Yan, PhD, will receive the Outstanding Investigator Award from the American Society for Investigative Pathology (ASIP) at its upcoming joint meeting in Salt Lake City with the American Society for Matrix Biology and The Histochemical Society.

The Breast Cancer Research Foundation (BCRF) Scientific Advisory Board and its Board of Directors recently announced its 2023 commitment to fund breast cancer research in 2023-2024, including eight grants at Yale Cancer Center and Smilow Cancer Hospital. Currently receiving funding through the BCRF are Kim Blenman, PhD, MS, Mehra Golshan, MD, MBA, Melinda Irwin, PhD, MPH, Adriana Kahn, MD, Ian Krop, MD, PhD, Lajos Pusztai, MD, David Rimm, MD, PhD, and Eric Winer, MD, to support their research.

Sarah Schellhorn, MD, Appointed Regional Service Line Medical Director for Central Shoreline Region

The Advanced Research Projects Agency for Health (ARPA-H) grant has been awarded to a team at Yale School of Medicine. The nearly $25 million award, titled “Curing the Uncurable via RNA Encoded Immunogene Tuning,” aims to train the immune system to better fight cancer and other diseases by educating specific immune cells with mRNA technology. Richard Edelson, MD, is a co-principal investigator on the project.

Patricia LoRusso, DO, received the Association of American Cancer Institute’s (AACI) 2023 Distinguished Scientist Award.

Susan Gueble, MD, PhD, is the recipient of a High-Risk, High-Reward National Institutes of Health (NIH) Director’s Early Independence Award.

Lieping Chen, MD, PhD, has been named one of eight Fierce Pharma’s 50 Breakthrough honorees for his contributions to immune checkpoints.

Kiran Turaga, MD, MPH, recently presented at the New England Surgical Society on “Utility of Circulating Tumor DNA Assessments in Characterizing Recurrence Sites After Optimal Resection for Metastatic Colorectal Cancer

Haris Mirza, MBBS, PhD, has been awarded a Clinical Scientist Research Career Development Award by the National Cancer Institute (NCI).

September 2023

Veda Giri, MD and Lajos Pusztai, MD, DPhil, have been named Fellows of the American Society of Clinical Oncology (FASCO).

Rachel Greenup, MD, MPH, has been appointed Co-Director of the Center for Breast Cancer.

Barbara Burtness, MD, has been appointed Co-Chair of the Society for Immunotherapy of Cancer (SITC) Head and Neck Squamous Cell Carcinoma Clinical Practice Guideline Committee.

The AACR Special Conference in Cancer Research: Pancreatic Cancer will be held next week in Boston. Yale participation includes Luisa Escobar- Hoyos, MSc, PhD, presenting the Rising Star: Keynote Lecture: “RNA switches” in pancreatic cancer: Expression, splicing and RNA-based therapeutics and Mandar Muzumdar, MD, will present a Plenary Talk: Feeding the Flames of Pancreatic Cancer. Natasha Pinto Medici, PhD, postdoctoral associate in the lab of Dr. Escobar-Hoyos, received the Minority Scholar in Cancer Research Award to attend and present her work at the conference.

Congratulations to the recent Yale Cancer Center recipients of SPORE Awards: 2023 Yale Head and Neck Cancer Developmental Research Awardees: He Wang, MD, PhD, Associate Professor of Pathology and Curtis Pickering, PhD, Associate Professor of Surgery 2023 Yale Head and Neck Cancer Career Enhancement Awardees: Thuy Tran, MD, PhD, Assistant Professor of Medicine (Medical Oncology) and Michael Chiorazzi, MD, PhD, Assistant Professor of Medicine (Medical Oncology) 2023 Yale SPORE in Lung Cancer Developmental Research Awardees: Mandar Muzumdar, MD, PhD, Associate Professor of Medicine (Medical Oncology), and Siyuan Wang, PhD, Associate Professor of Genetics and Cell Biology and Andrew Xiao, PhD, Associate Professor of Genetics; Ya Ha, PhD, Associate Professor of Pharmacology; Lisa Fucito, PhD, Associate Professor of Psychiatry; Luisa Escobar-Hoyos, PhD, Assistant Professor of Therapeutic Radiology 2023 Yale SPORE in Lung Cancer Career Enhancement Awardees: Jiyeon Kim, PhD, Assistant Professor of Urology and Cellular & Molecular Physiology; Mark Lee, MD, PhD, Assistant Professor of Lab Medicine and Pathology; Arnaud Augert, PhD, Assistant Professor of Pathology; Bluma Lesch, MD, PhD, Associate Professor of Genetics

August 2023

The laboratory of David A. Braun, MD, PhD has received approximately $5.75M in federal awards to fund mechanisms of response and resistance to immune therapy in kidney cancer. The National Cancer Institute awarded Dr.
Braun an R37 MERIT Award, which is an extension of an R01.

Dr. Braun has joined the leadership of the Yale Medical Oncology-Hematology Fellowship Program as the Associate Program Director for Research.

Veda Giri, MD, received a grant from Bakes for Breast Cancer.

David Carlson, PhD, DABR, FAAPM, has been named a Fellow of the American Society for Radiation Oncology (FASTRO).

Seth Herzon, PhD, is the inaugural winner of the A.V. Rama Rao Award.

Dr. Herzon has received an R01 in collaboration with Ranjit Bindra, MD, PhD, to support their research, “Novel therapeutics for the targeted eradication of DDR-defective tumors.”

Stephanie Halene, MD, has been appointed Arthur H. and Isabel Bunker Professor of Medicine (Hematology) and Professor of Pathology.

Kurt Schalper, MD, PhD, was the recipient of the Best Mentor Award at the 2023 Methods in Clinical Cancer Research Workshop.

Congratulations to Layla Van Doren, MD, MBA, named our 2023 Forget Scholar. She also has received an Education Research Grant from the Yale Department of Internal Medicine to study “Exploring providers’ preferences for education on the management of patients with sickle cell disease (SCD).”

Jacqueline Gaddy, MD, has been selected to participate in the Robert A. Winn Diversity in Clinical Trials: Career Development Award (Winn CDA).

George Goshua, MD, MSc, has been invited to join the Annals of Internal Medicine Editorial Board for a three-year term, effective July 1, 2023.

July 2023


Scott Huntington, MD, MPH, MSc has been appointed Interim Chief Quality Officer for Smilow Cancer Hospital

Michael Hurwitz, MD, PhD, has been appointed Assistant Director of Cancer Research Training and Education Coordination (CRTEC) for Yale Cancer Center. CRTEC, chaired by Harriet Kluger, MD, and co-led by Dr. Hurwitz and David Stern, PhD, is focused on bolstering and coordinating the training activities across the spectrum of disciplines.

Kiran Turaga, MD, MPH, has been awarded a CA CURE Grant from the GI Research Foundation to support his research into the “Development of 5hmc Based Plasma Signatures (Liquid Biopsy) in the Detection of Patients with Peritoneal Metastases.”

Mandar Muzumdar, MD, has received funding for a Research Project R01 Grant from the NIH to support his research on “Dietary fatty acids drive pancreatic cancer development.”

Andrew Goodman, PhD, has been appointed Chair of the Department of Microbial Pathogenesis.

Shuangge (Steven) Ma, PhD, has been appointed Chair of the Department of Biostatistics at Yale School of Public Health.

Ronan Talty, MD-PhD Candidate in the laboratory of Marcus Bosenberg, MD, PhD, received the 2023 ASA La Roche-Posay Medical Student Grant Targeting Melanoma and Skin Cancer by The American Skin Association in recognition of his project, “Targeting Lipid Droplet Synthesis to Augment Melanoma Immunotherapy Responses.”

Anish Sharda, MD, MPH, is the 2023 recipient of the JH Milstone Grant. The JH Milstone Fund was established to support early-stage investigators with innovative research that improves the understanding of bleeding, thrombosis, or thrombolysis in memory of JH Milstone, MD, by his son, Leonard M. Milstone, MD ’70, Professor Emeritus of Dermatology, and daughter-in-law, Ellen B. Milstone, MD ’69.

Jeffrey Townsend, PhD, received the 2023 Reducing Disease Risk Award from Yale School of Public Health in recognition of his publication, “Attribution of Cancer Origins to Endogenous, Exogenous, and Preventable Mutational Processes.”

Caroline Johnson, PhD, was awarded the 2023 Women in Science (WomiX) Mentorship Award from the Metabolomics Association of North America at their annual conference in June.

June 2023

Priya Jamidar, FACG, FASGE, MBChB, was recently presented with a Lifetime Achievement Award by the Connecticut Association of Physicians of Indian Origin (CAPI) at their 32nd annual meeting.

Nadine Housri, MD, has received the Healio Disruptive Innovator Award in Clinical Innovation.

Luisa Escobar-Hoyos, MSc, PhD, was named to the 2023 class of the Pew- Stewart Scholars Program for Cancer Research.

Maryam Lustberg, MD, MPH, has been named Co-Chair of the ASCO Survivorship Guideline Advisory Group, which formulates the guidelines on survivorship care on behalf of ASCO.

Sabrina Browning, MD, has been invited to participate on the Steering Committee for the Amyloidosis Research Consortium to address best practices, referral networks, and coordinated care models for patients.

Yale Ventures announced the recipients of the 2023 Blavatnik Awards, including six Yale Cancer Center members for cancer-related research: Anton Bennett, PhD; Michael Girardi, MD; Peter Glazer, MD, PhD; Ruslan Medzhitov, PhD; David Spiegel, MD, PhD

Roy S. Herbst, MD, PhD, participated in a panel discussion during the Yale Innovation Summit hosted by Yale Ventures on the Hottest New Ideas in Oncology: Translating Science to Treatments for Patients.

Veda Giri, MD, hosted a national Roundtable Conference on Engaging Black Men in Prostate Cancer Genetic Testing with the Sidney Kimmel Cancer Center.

May 2023

Congratulations to the Yale Medical Oncology-Hematolog Fellowship Program 2023 recipients of Conquer Cancer®, the ASCO Foundation, Young Investigator Awards: Curt Perry, MD, PhD (mentor: Jeff Ishizuka, MD, DPhil); Jeremy Jacox, MD, PhD (mentor: Mandar Muzumdar, MD); and Adriana Kahn, MD (mentor: Lajos Pusztai, MD, DPhil).

Akiko Iwasaki, PhD, has been selected as the 2023 recipient of the Connecticut Medal of Science. Dr. Iwasaki has also been named President of the American Association of Immunologists (AAI).

Christi Kim, MD, FACP, has been appointed as a member of the NRG Publications Committee effective immediately. NRG Oncology is a clinical cooperative group including the National Surgical Adjuvant Breast and Bowel Project (NSABP), the Radiation Therapy Oncology Group (RTOG), and the Gynecologic Oncology Group (GOG).

Xiaolei Su, PhD, has received a Pershing Square Sohn Prize for Young Investigators in Cancer Research, which is awarded each year to cancer research scientists and physician-scientists based in the greater New York City area.

Stavroula Hatzios, PhD, Assistant Professor of Molecular, Cellular and Developmental Biology and of Chemistry and a member of Yale Cancer Center’s Cancer Immunology Research Program, has received a 2023 American Chemical Society Infectious Diseases Young Investigator Award. Barbara A. Ward, MD, has been named an Associate Professor of Surgery (Surgical Oncology) at Yale School of Medicine

Connecticut Magazine recognized 81 physicians from Smilow Cancer Hospital and Yale Cancer Center, with its annual “Top Doctors” issue.

Mathieu Bakhoum, MD, PhD, has been awarded a Department of Defense (DoD) Grant to study the molecular mechanism underlying uveal melanoma progression.

The National Academy of Sciences announced the election of 120 members in recognition of their distinguished and continuing achievements in original research, including Anna Maria Pyle, PhD.

Akiko Iwasaki, PhD, has been selected to receive the 2023 Else Kröner Fresenius Prize for Medical Research, one of the most prestigious honors of its kind.

Christina Holt, MSN, APRN (BC), ACHPN, OCN, has been recognized by The Hastings Center and The Cunniff-Dixon Foundation for Outstanding End-of-Life Care.

Lieping Chen, MD, presented the George Adrouny Memorial Lecture at Tulane University on The Coming Era of Tumor-Site Focused Immunotherapy.

Rachel Perry, PhD, has received the Endocrinology and Metabolism Section New Investigator Award from the American Physiological Society.

Inaugural Cancer Disparities Research Awards: Michaela Dinan, PhD: Socioeconomic Disparities in the Etiology of Advanced Breast Cancer; Brinda Emu, MD, and Jessica Lewis, PhD, LMFT: Cancer Outcome Disparities among Patients with HIV and Cancer: Integrated Approach to Address Social Determinants of Health; Leah Ferrucci, PhD, MPH, and Bubu Banini, MD, PhD: Reducing Disparities in Liver Cancer Outcomes in Connecticut; Veda Giri, MD, PhD, and Nancy Borstelmann, PhD, MPH, LICSW: PROgram to address psychosocial Support, clinical outcomes, and genomic insights for Patients with EaRly-onset cancers – The PROSPER Study; Henry Park, MD, MPH: Disparities in Stereotactic Radiosurgery Access for Brain Metastases from Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer and Breast Cancer

April 2023

Jessica Stempel, MD, FACP, Clinical Fellow, has been selected by the American Society of Hematology (ASH) for the Minority Hematology Fellow Award Program - MD/DO Fellow -2023 to support her proposal, "Use of metformin and outcomes in older patients with classical myeloproliferative neoplasms."

Eric Winer, MD, is the recipient of the Peter I. Pressman Award from the New York Metropolitan Breast Cancer Group.

The Lung Cancer Research Foundation (LCRF) has selected Katerina Politi, PhD, as an honoree for their annual Evening of Innovation gala.

Jorge Galán, PhD, DVM, has been elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

Cece Calhoun, MD, has been invited to serve as faculty for this year’s American Society of Hematology Clinical Research Training Institute in Latin America in Sao Paulo, Brazil.

Patricia LoRusso, DO, PhD (h), has been elected to the 2023 Class of Fellows of the AACR Academy by the American Association for Cancer Research. Dr. LoRusso, while also being recently elected to serve as AACR President-Elect, will become one of 23 Fellows, and was recognized “for unrivaled clinical cancer research contributions including expertly and extensively designing and executing innovative early-phase clinical trials; and for improving therapeutic outcomes to not only reduce mortality rates, but also enhance the quality of life for patients with cancer.”

Jacquelyne Gaddy, MD, MSc, has received a Spring 2023 ECOG-ACRIN Minority Scholarship Travel Award from the ECOG-ACRIN Cancer Research Group to attend the ECOG-ACRIN Semi-Annual Group May 3-5 in Chicago.

Francesca Montanari, MD, has been selected to attend the 2023 Early Career Women Faculty Leadership Development Seminar hosted by the Association of American Medical Colleges in Boston this July.

Craig Crews, PhD, was honored on April 4 with an Ivy Award, part of New Haven's annual Elm-Ivy Awards presentation.

March 2023

Patricia M. LoRusso, DO, PhD (hc), Elected as American Association for Cancer Research President-Elect for 2023-2024.

Bohdan Pomahac, MD, was recently appointed the Frank F. Kanthak Professor of Surgery (Plastics).

D. S. Fahmeed Hyder, PhD, has been named Head of Trumbull College at Yale University.

Dhanpat Jain, MD, was recently recognized by the National Cancer Institute for lending his subject matter expertise to the Cancer Pathology Coding Histology and Registration Terminology (Cancer PathCHART).

Akiko Iwasaki, PhD, has been named to the STATUS List 2023 compiled by the medical and science news publication STAT.

Gordon Sze, MD, has been awarded the American Society of Neuroradiology's (ASNR's) 2023 Gold Medal

The American Cancer Society has awarded a four-year grant to Shi-Yi Wang, MD, PhD, Cary Gross, MD, and Anne Chiang, MD, PhD. Their research proposal seeks to determine which treatment sequences produce the best results for people with advanced cancer while examining the cost of these treatments.

Yuval Kluger, PhD, was recently appointed the Anthony N. Brady Professor of Pathology.

Marcus Bosenberg, MD, PhD, was recently appointed the Anthony N. Brady Professor of Dermatology, Pathology, and Immunobiology.

Jacquelyne Gaddy, MD, MSc, has been appointed Deputy Director of the Diversity Enhancement Program in Oncology and a core faculty member of the Center for Community Engagement and Health Equity. In addition, she has been selected Co-Director of the Oncology Summer Internship sponsored by ASCO and to participate in Dr. Kemi Doll’s “Get That Grant” coaching program. She recently received an American Cancer Society Pilot Award for Underrepresented Minorities to support her project, “Relationship of Race/Ethnicity to Timely Palliative Medicine Referral for Patients Diagnosed with Gastrointestinal (GI) Malignancies.”

Christi Kim, MD, has been appointed to a second two-year team on the Society of Gynecologic Oncology (SGO) Clinical Practice Committee beginning on April 1, 2023.

Anne Mongiu, MD, PhD, has been selected to serve as a Co-Director of the Colorectal Cancer (CRC) Program in the Center for Gastrointestinal Cancers at Yale Cancer Center and Smilow Cancer Hospital.

Susan Baserga, MD, PhD, and Mark Lemmon, PhD, FRS, have been named new Fellows of the American Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology (ASBMB).

Roy S. Herbst, MD, PhD, participated in the American Association for Cancer Research (AACR) Early-Career Hill Day to accompany a group of early-career investigators to visit Representative Rosa DeLauro and share the importance of funding for cancer research.

Rachel Perry, PhD, has been selected to receive the American Physiological Society's New Investigator Award for 2023.

The Connecticut Academy of Science and Engineering (CASE) has elected 35 new members for 2023. Yale Cancer Center members elected to the Academy include Carlos Fernández-Hernando, PhD, Steven Kleinstein, PhD, Markus Müschen, MD, PhD, and Jordan Pober, MD, PhD.

February 2023

Jeremy Kortmansky, MD, has been appointed Clinical Director for the Division of GI Medical Oncology.

Jason Sheltzer, PhD, has been awarded a Discovery Award by the Mark Foundation for Cancer Research to support his project, Developing CDK11 Inhibition as a Novel Anti-Cancer Strategy.

Michael Girardi, MD, has been elected to the Association of American Physicians (AAP).

Ian Krop, MD, PhD, has been appointed Professor of Medicine (Medical Oncology).

Asher Marks, MD, has received a Health 2.0 Conference Leadership Award. He is recognized for his continued dedication to advancing XR (extended reality) applications in medicine.

David Braun, MD, PhD, has been awarded an American Society for Clinical Investigation (ASCI) Young Physician-Scientist Award.

January 2023

Faye Rogers, PhD, has been appointed to the recently formed NCCN DEI Directors Forum.

Michaela Dinan, PhD, has been named Associate Editor of the Journal of the National Cancer Institute (JNCI).

Jill Lacy, MD, has been appointed Editor-in Chief of ASCO-SEP, the medical oncology self-evaluation program.

Luisa F. Escobar-Hoyos, PhD, and Mandar Muzumdar, MD, have both received Stage 2 continuation support for Innovator Awards from the Damon Runyon Cancer Research Foundation to fund their projects.

Pat LoRusso, DO, is a Nominee for AACR President

Sanjay Aneja, MD, PhD, has been appointed Assistant Cancer Center Director for Bioinformatics

Anne Chiang, MD, PhD, has been named Associate Cancer Center Director for Clinical Initiatives

Nita Ahuja, MD, has been named an Associate Cancer Center Director for Surgical Services

Faye Rogers, PhD, has been appointed Associate Director for DEI.

Patrick Kenney, MD, has been appointed Oncology Service Line Medical Director for Greenwich.

Aarti Bhatia, MD, MPH, has been named Leader of the Head & Neck Disease-Aligned Research Team (DART) for Yale Cancer Center and Smilow Cancer Hospital.

Melissa Young, MD, PhD, has been appointed Medical Director of the Smilow Cancer Hospital Radiation Oncology Program in New Haven.

Laura Baum, MD, MPH, has published a book chapter titled "Pain and Palliative Care" in Holland-Frei Cancer Medicine, along with Cardinale Smith, MD, PhD.

December 2022

Mathieu Bakhoum, MD, PhD, has received a grant from the Connecticut Lions Eye Research Foundation (CLERF).

Ranjit Bindra, MD, PhD, has been named the 2022 BioCT Entrepreneur of the Year.

Steven H. Kleinstein, PhD, has been appointed Anthony N. Brady Professor of Pathology.

Rong Fan, PhD, has been appointed the Harold D. Hodgkinson Professor of Biomedical Engineering at Yale University.

Barbara Burtness, MD, has been named Chief Translational Research Officer for Yale Cancer Center and Smilow Cancer Hospital and Associate Cancer Center Director for Translational Research for Yale Cancer Center.

Bruce McGibbon, MD, is the recipient of the 2022 Norm Roth Leadership Award from Greenwich Hospital.

The Lustgarten Foundation announced Mandar Muzumdar, MD, as the recipient of a 2022 Innovation and Collaboration Program Grant. The funding will support his study titled “Dietary oleic acid reprograms pancreatic lipid metabolism to drive cancer development.”

Michael Cecchini, MD, was appointed to the Colon Task Force of the NCI Gastrointestinal Steering Committee for a two-year term as an early career investigator.

Tara Sanft, MD, has been accepted into the Faculty-in-Training program (FIT) at the Academy of Communication in Healthcare (ACH).

The American Brain Tumor Association (ABTA) recently announced funding of Discovery Grants to Henk De Feyter, PhD, and Jacky Yeung, MD.

Jessica M. Stempel, MD, a second-year fellow in the Yale Medical Oncology-Hematology Fellowship Program, has received the Patterson Trust Mentored Research Award

Paul Stockhammer, MD, PhD, a third-year internal medicine resident at the Yale School of Medicine, and a research member of the Politi Lab, received the Distinguished Young Investigator Research Award at this year’s EGFR Resisters Research Summit.

Giulia Biancon, PhD, has been awarded the 2022 Italian Scientists & Scholars in North America Foundation (ISSNAF) Young Investigator Paola Campese Award.

October 2022

Yale Faculty Innovation Awards:

  • Demetrios Braddock, MD, PhD: Petragen
  • Ranjit Bindra, MD, PhD and Seth Herzon, PhD: Modifi
  • Ranjit Bindra, MD, PhD: Alphina Therapeutics
  • Sidi Chen, PhD: Cellinfinity Bio
  • Craig Crews, PhD: Siduma Therapeutics
  • Farren Isaacs, PhD: Pearl Bio
  • Akiko Iwasaki, PhD and Anna Marie Pyle, PhD: RIGGImmune
  • Aaron Ring, MD, PhD: Seranova Bio

Peter Glazer, MD, PhD, was elected to the National Academy of Medicine.

Suzanne Evans, MD, MPH, has been elected a Fellow of the American Society for Radiation Oncology (FASTRO).

Antonio Omuro, MD, has been elected a Fellow of the American Academy of Neurology (FAAN).

Roy S. Herbst, MD, PhD, was honored by the Foundation for the National Institutes of Health in Chicago last night at a commemorative dinner during SWOG’s fall meeting in celebration of his 10 years of leadership and commitment to the Lung-MAP Trial.

George Goshua, MD, MSc, has been invited to serve as a voting member of the Independent Appraisal Committee for the Institute for Clinical and Economic Review, the leading Health Technology Assessment Agency in the U.S.

Hyundai Hope on Wheels presented Juan Vasquez, MD, with a $300,000 Scholar Hope Grant.

Thiruvengadam Muniraj, MD, Associate Professor of Medicine (Digestive Diseases), has become associate editor of the journal Gastrointestinal Endoscopy, the official publication of the American Society for Gastrointestinal Endoscopy.

Luisa Escobar-Hoyos, MSc, PhD was awarded a New Innovator Award from the National Institutes of Health through the High-Risk, High-Reward Research Program.

Mehra Golshan, MD, MBA, has been named Chair of the Education Committee for the National Accreditation Program for Breast Centers (NAPBC).

Barbara Burtness, MD, has been named to the Scientific Advisory Board for the Fanconi Anemia Research Fund.

Edward Perry, Jr., MD, has received a $5000 grant from the department of medicine to support his project, “Development and Implementation of a Novel Opioid Pain Management Curriculum for Oncology Fellows.”


September 2022

2022 Head and Neck SPORE Developmental Research Awardees: Megan King, PhD, and Patrick Lusk, PhD: Nuclear integrity as a novel modulator of the radiation response in head and neck cancer. Jong Woo Lee, PhD: Autophagy inhibition to potentiate AURKA inhibitor therapy in head and neck cancer. 2022 Head and Neck Career Enhancement Awardees: Michael Chiorazzi, MD, PhD: Investigation of the HNSCC Tumor Microenvironment and Response to Therapy with Autologous Humanized Mice (Mentor: Richard Flavell, PhD, FRS) and He (Peter) Wang, MD, PhD: Electronic cigarette exposure on oral mucosa carcinogenesis (Mentors: Barbara Burtness, MD, Qin Yan, PhD)

Evan Morris, PhD, is one of four university leaders from across the country who have received an Academy Engagement Network antisemitism education grant. This grant will help educate the next generation of leaders about contemporary antisemitism while fostering a positive campus climate for the community.

David Schatz, PhD, is a co-winner of the 2023 Paul Ehrlich and Ludwig Darmstaedter Prize.

Elena Ratner, MD, has been appointed as the inaugural Director of Women’s Health System Development for the Yale New Haven Health System and Vice Chair for Gynecology in the Department of Obstetrics, Gynecology & Reproductive Sciences.

Pamela Kunz, MD, has been named President of The North American Neuroendocrine Tumor Society (NANETS).

David Braun, MD, PhD, and Nazli Dizman, MD, have both received Trailblazer Awards from the Kidney Cancer Association. Dr. Braun’s project is titled, “Dissecting the immunobiology of chromophobe renal cell carcinoma using single-cell transcriptomics” and Dr. Dizman will research the “Impact of CBM588 on metabolomic profile in patients with metastatic renal cell carcinoma (mRCC).”

Smita Krishnaswamy, PhD, has received the Excellence in Science Early-Career Investigator Award from the Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology (FASEB). The award recognizes the impact Dr. Krishnaswamy’s research, teaching, and community efforts have made in the scientific community.

Cathy Garcia, a graduate student in the laboratory of Mandar Muzumdar, MD, is the recipient of a F-31 Diversity Fellowship Award from the National Cancer Institute. Cathy will use the funding to continue her research into, “Elucidating mechanisms of endocrine-exocrine signaling in obesity-driven pancreatic cancer.”

The Breast Cancer Research Foundation (BCRF) Scientific Advisory Board and Board of Directors recently announced BCRF’s 2022 research grants. Six grants at Yale Cancer Center and Smilow Cancer Hospital were awarded to Mehra Golshan, MD, MBA; Melinda Irwin, PhD, MPH; Ian Krop, MD, PhD; Lajos Pusztai, MD; David Rimm, MD, PhD; and Eric Winer, MD.

Mariya Rozenblit, MD, is the recipient of the 2022 SITC-Natera ctDNA in Immunotherapy Response Monitoring Fellowship and Technology Award from the Society for Immunotherapy of Cancer. Dr. Rozenblit will use the funding to support her research project on “The tumor microenvironment of triple negative breast cancers with detectable circulating tumor DNA after pembrolizumab treatment.”

Rachel Greenup, MD, MPH, has received an R01 from the National Cancer Institute, along with Shoshana Rosenberg, ScD, MPH, at Weill Cornell Medicine, to support their project, "Effectiveness and implementation of a decision support tool to improve surgical decision making in young women with breast cancer.”

James Clune, MD, has been appointed to the VA National Plastic Surgery Advisory Board.

Murat Gunel, MD, recently received the prestigious Ralph G. Dacey Medal for Outstanding Cerebrovascular Research at the recent Joint Cerebrovascular Section meeting of the American Association of Neurological Surgeons and the Congress of Neurological Surgeons.

The National Accreditation Program for Rectal Cancer (NAPRC) has named Dhanpat Jain, MD, to represent the College of American Pathologists on the NAPRC’s Quality Assurance Committee.

Hamita Sachar, MD, has been recognized as a rising leader nationally by the American Society for Gastrointestinal Endoscopy, which recently selected her for its GI Organization Leadership Development (GOLD) Program.

The American College of Surgeons Foundation has awarded Elizabeth Berger, MD, MS, a Health Policy Scholarship and Holly Blackburn, MD, a Resident Research Scholarship.

Kathleen Suozzi, MD, has received a Rising Star Award from the Association of Academic Cosmetic Dermatologists. The award recognizes early and mid-career faculty who consistently demonstrate commitment to advancing academic cosmetic dermatology, teaching cosmetic dermatology to trainees, and providing exceptional patient care.

Xiaolei Su, PhD, received an award from the Gabrielle's Angel Foundation for Cancer Research. This award supports a three-year project on designing new chimeric antigen receptors with improved anti-tumor efficacy. Dr. Su's group focuses on understanding immune receptor signaling and leveraging that knowledge to develop novel strategies for cancer immunotherapy.

Elizabeth Prsic, MD, has been selected to participate in the Emerging Leaders Program at Yale, a joint initiative between Yale School of Medicine and Yale New Haven Health.

August 2022

The Section of Medical Oncology at Yale Cancer Center is pleased to welcome Larisa Kamga, PhD, and Taylor Barrow, as the first students to participate in the new Diversity Enhancement Program in Oncology.

Cece Calhoun, MD, was presented with the Top Health Professionals Under Forty Award from the National Medical Association (NMA) Post-Graduate Section.

Yang Yang-Hartwich, PhD, has received a 5-year R01 grant from the National Cancer Institute to study, “Uncovering the Mechanisms of Metastasis in Fallopian Tube-Originated Ovarian Cancer.” Smita Krishnaswamy, PhD, is co-investigator on the grant.

Amy Justice, MD, PhD, has received the William S. Middleton Award.

The Herzon and Bindra Labs recently published a new approach to exploit DNA repair defects in the journal Science.

July 2022

Harriet Kluger, MD has been appointed Cushing Professor and Vice Chair of Internal Medicine.

The Center for Gastrointestinal Cancers (CGIC) at Smilow Cancer Hospital and Yale Cancer Center, led by Pamela Kunz, MD, and Mandar Deepak Muzumdar, MD, has selected three Yale Cancer Center teams for funding through its inaugural 2022-2023 CGIC Seed Grant Program: John Kunstman, MD, MHS, FACS, Jason Sheltzer, PhD, and Jeffrey Townsend, PhD: Combining Phylogenetic Mapping and Aneuploidy Analysis to Define Neuroendocrine Tumor Metastatic Progression, Anne Mongiu, MD, PhD, Maryam Lustberg, MD, MPH, and Michael Cecchini, MD: Novel Single Nucleotide Polymorphisms in Oxaliplatin-Induced Peripheral Neuropathy and Low Anterior Resection Syndrome, and Rosa Munoz Xicola, PhD, and Andrew Thomas DeWan, PhD, MPH: Genetic Drivers of Early Onset Colorectal Cancer in African Americans.

Gavitt Woodard, MD, is the recipient of a 2022 Young Investigator Grant from the International Lung Cancer Foundation to study gene expression and T-cell dysfunction in enlarging semi-solid lung adenocarcinomas.

Aileen Fernandez, PhD, postdoctoral fellow in the laboratory of David Rimm, MD, PhD, is one of 10 recipients of the 2022 Dr. Eddie Méndez Award.

Cece Calhoun, MD, MPHS, MBA, Appointed Director of the Sickle Cell Program at Smilow Cancer Hospital

The Center for Community Engagement and Health Equity, directed by Marcella Nunez-Smith, MD, MHS, has selected three Yale Cancer Center investigators to be funded to take part in the year-long “Foundations of Community-Engaged Research” course offered through the National Clinician Scholars Program. Congratulations to Jacquelyne Gaddy, MD, MSc, Anup Sharma, PhD, and Sandra Zaeh, MD MS.

Haifan Lin, PhD, has been named President of the International Society for Stem Cell Research.

Dhanpat Jain, MD, has been named to the Cancer Committee of the College of American Pathologists (CAP).

June 2022

Marie Robert, MD, has been honored with a Yale Medicine Distinguished Clinical Career Award. Dr. Robert is an internationally-recognized gastrointestinal, liver, and pancreatic surgical pathologist. She has more than 30 years of exp?erience in clinical diagnosis, teaching, and collaborative scientific endeavors across a wide spectrum of diseases, including inflammatory and neoplastic conditions of the GI tract.

Michael Girardi, MD, an internationally-recognized investigator and translational expert in the advancement of personalized therapy for cutaneous T cell lymphoma (CTCL), was recently appointed the Evans Professor of Dermatology. Dr. Girardi is a member of Yale Cancer Center’s Cancer Immunology Research Program.

John Lewin, MD, FSBI, has been elected President of the Society of Breast Imaging.

Elizabeth Berger, MD, MS, was presented with The C. Elton Cahow Teaching Award for Outstanding Faculty Teaching by Mehra Golshan, MD, MBA, during Yale Surgery’s annual awards program. The award honors the faculty member who has contributed the most to the education of the junior residents.

Ronald Salem, MD, FACS, FRSC (Ed), FRCS(C), MBChB, was presented with The Edward H. Storer Award by the Department of Surgery.

Maryam Lustberg, MD, MPH, has been named to the Cancer Health 25 list in recognition of her work to improve the long-term side effects for patients with breast cancer and her broader vision of supportive care for all patients and survivors of cancer.

Pamela Kunz, MD, has been awarded the Wendy U. and Thomas C. Naratil Pioneer Award by Women’s Health Research at Yale to study sex-based differences in adverse events associated with treating neuroendocrine neoplasms.

Susan G. Komen announced new research grants to support breast cancer research at Yale Cancer Center, including funding to support Lajos Pusztai, MD, DPhil, and Mariya Rozenblit, MD.

Mehra Golshan, MD, MBA, has been awarded a Service Excellence Award by Healthnetwork Foundation in recognition of outstanding clinical care.

Benjamin L. Judson, MD, MBA, has been appointed the Charles W. Ohse Professor of Surgery (Otolaryngology) at Yale School of Medicine.

Nikhil Joshi, PhD, is a recipient of the 2022 Pershing Square Sohn Prize for Young Investigators in Cancer Research.

Chen Liu, MD, PhD, has been elected to his second term as chair of the Practice & Management Committee of the Association of Pathology Chairs (APC).

Giulia Biancon, PhD, a postdoctoral associate in the laboratory of Stephanie Halene, MD, PhD, was recognized with a Best Poster Award at the 27th Annual Meeting of the RNA Society in Boulder, CO.

Tamar Taddei, MD, has assumed the role of Chief of Gastroenterology at the Veterans Affairs (VA) Connecticut Healthcare System.

May 2022

Craig M. Crews, PhD, has received the 2022 Connecticut Medal of Technology from the Connecticut Academy of Science and Engineering.

Lynn T. Tanoue, MD, MBA, has received the American Thoracic Society (ATS) Thoracic Oncology Lifetime Achievement Award in recognition of her mentorship, devoted career in thoracic oncology and lung cancer screening and diagnosis, and dedication to the ATS.

Marcus Bosenberg, MD, PhD, has received a Leveraged Finance Fights Melanoma – Melanoma Research Alliance Team Science Award to support his research, Targeting Epigenetics to Enhance Anti-Melanoma Immunity.

Claudio R. Alarcón PhD, received a Young Investigator Award from the Melanoma Research Alliance to support his project, New genetic tools to understand the role of m6A in melanomagenesis.

Ehud Mendel, MD, MBA, co-chaired the Seattle Science Foundation 12th Annual Multimodal Treatment of Spinal Tumors Conference and presented the highly coveted Beks Lecture as part of the Annual Congress of the Dutch Society of Neurosurgery.

Michael Leapman, MD, received the John N. Forrest Jr. Prize for Mentorship in Student Research.

Dr. Roy S. Herbst was this year’s inductee for Giant of Cancer Care in Lung Cancer.

Congratulations to our Conquer Cancer Foundation Young Investigator awardees, Julia Foldi, MD, and James Laird, MD

Patricia LoRusso, DO, was inducted in as a Fellow of the American Society of Clinical Oncology (FASCO)

The Society of General Internal Medicine has given its Distinguished Professor of Women’s Health Best Oral Abstract Award to Ilana Richman, MD, MHS, for “Estimating Breast Cancer Overdiagnosis Among Older Women in the U.S.”

Roy S. Herbst, MD, PhD, was honored earlier by Friends of Cancer Research as one of 25 scientific and advocacy leaders who, through their work and partnership, have been instrumental over the course of the last 25 years in making significant advancements for patients. Dr. Herbst was also named a Giant of Cancer Care® for Lung Cancer by OncLive.

Khanh Nguyen, MD, was awarded the YNHH Nurses’ Choice Award. The award is presented to “an outstanding individual who is not a nurse, but one who supports and recognizes the importance of the practice of nursing at YNHH.”

Congratulations to Brianna Lutz, RN, who received Yale New Haven Hospital's first ever Daisy Leadership Award in recognition of her dedicated leadership on NP12, the Smilow Extended Care Clinic, and the Smilow Rapid Evaluation Clinic. Lindsey Spohn, RN, an inpatient nurse on NP12, also received the Daisy Award for Extraordinary Nurses, which is presented twice a year to a nurse at YNHH.

Arman Avesta, MD, graduate student in the laboratory of Sanjay Aneja, MD, has received a grant from the Radiological Society of North America to study capsule networks for MRI image segmentation.

April 2022

Cary Gross, MD, has been named to the Association of American Physicians (AAP).

David Braun, MD, PhD, has been named a Goodman and Gilman Yale Scholar, an award that recognizes junior faculty members at Yale School of Medicine for their research and research potential.

Aileen Fernandez, PhD, postdoctoral fellow in the laboratory of David Rimm, MD, PhD, and Krishna Mudumbi, PhD, postdoctoral associate in the laboratory of Mark Lemmon, PhD, FRS, have been selected as Duke Next Generation Leaders, a new initiative at Duke University aimed at bringing together cohorts of talented postdoctoral scientists and mentoring them for academic faculty careers.

Ruslan Medzhitov, PhD, has been elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences (AAAS).

Lajos Pusztai, MD, DPhil, has been reappointed as a Komen Scholar for a 3-year term to help lead the Susan G. Komen scientific peer review process.

The Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology (FASEB) has honored Valentina Greco, PhD, with its Mid-Career Investigator Award.

Sayeef Mirza, MD, MPH, has been accepted to participate in the prestigious 2022 American Society for Transplantation and Cellular Therapy (ASTCT) Clinical Research Training Course in Park City, Utah this summer.

Xinyan Zhang, MD, PhD, postdoctoral associate in the laboratory of Xiaolei Su, PhD, Jianshu Wang, PhD, postdoctoral associate in the laboratory of David Schatz, PhD, and Ashish Kumar, PhD, postdoctoral associate in the laboratory of Franziska Bleichert, PhD, received Leslie H. Warner Postdoctoral Fellowships from Yale Cancer Center.

The American Society for Investigative Pathology (ASIP) has announced it will honor Qin Yan, PhD with its 2023 Outstanding Investigator Award.

Roy S. Herbst, MD, PhD, has been appointed Chair of the American Association for Cancer Research Scientific Policy and Government Affairs Committee.

The American Association for Cancer Research recently announced awards to support three young scientists from Yale Cancer Center to attend the 2022 Annual Meeting of the American Association for Cancer Research earlier this week. Fernando de Miguel, PhD, Meaghan McGeary, a PhD candidate in the Bosenberg Lab, and Matt Murray, a PhD candidate in the Bindra Lab all received travel awards.

Maryam Lustberg, MD, MPH, has joined the Advisory Committee on Breast Cancer in Young Women of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

Rachel Perry, PhD, and Adebowale Adeniran, MD, and Andrew Wang, MD/PhD, AB, co-investigators, have received an R01 grant from the National Institutes of Health to research whether a liver-derived hormone affects renal cell carcinoma, the most common form of kidney cancer.

Leah Tenenbaum has recently achieved certification as a Palliative Care and Hospice Advanced Certified Chaplain by the Board of Chaplaincy Certification (BCCI).

Dhanpat Jain, MD, has been named President of the Hans Popper Hepatopathology Society (HPHS).

Patricia LoRusso, DO, has been awarded the 2022 Joseph H. Burchenal Award for Outstanding Achievement in Clinical Cancer Research by the American Association for Cancer Research.

Craig Crews, PhD, received the 2022 Irving Weinstein Foundation Distinguished Lectureship Award from the American Association for Cancer Research.

Ian Krop, MD, PhD, shared Yale Cancer Center and Smilow Cancer Hospital's appreciation for the leadership Roy S. Herbst, MD, PhD, and Alyssa Gateman, MPH, CCRP, brought to the Clinical Trials Office throughout 2021.

The American Association for Cancer Research (AACR) has presented two awards to further diversity, equity, and inclusion in cancer research to the Escobar-Hoyos Lab, under the direction of Luisa Escobar-Hoyos, MSc, PhD, Dr. Escobar-Hoyos is the 2022 recipient of an AACR Career Development Award. A postdoctoral associate in the Escobar-Hoyos laboratory, Natasha Pinto Medici, PhD, is the recipient of a 2022 AACR Career Development Award to further diversity, equity, and inclusion in cancer research.

Kim Blenman, PhD, MS, has been selected for a 2022 Joint Breast Cancer Research Foundation-American Association for Cancer Research (BCRF-AACR) Career Development Award to advance her research in “Characterization of pre-existing autoantibodies in breast cancer.”

Niketa Shah, MD, presented her research on the “Impact of Including Abatacept for Graft-Versus-Host Disease Prophylaxis in Allogeneic Stem Cell Transplantation for Hemoglobinopathy” at the 48th Annual Meeting of the European Society for Blood and Marrow Transplantation earlier this month.

The National Comprehensive Cancer Network is hosting their annual conference, including several presentations from Yale Cancer Center and Smilow Cancer Hospital including, Anne Chiang, MD, PhD, Meena S. Moran, MD, Sarah Schellhorn Mougalian, MD, and Tara Sanft, MD.

Kim Blenman, PhD, MS, was recently appointed as a co-director of MORE.

March 2022

Melinda Irwin, PhD, MPH, received a new U01 cooperative agreement grant from the NCI to support research into the impact of diet and exercise for women with ovarian cancer.

Prajwal Boddu, MD, a fourth year fellow in Hematology/Oncology and graduate student in the Investigative Medicine Program, was awarded a 3-year Young Investigator Award from EvansMDS.

Anup Sharma, MD, PhD, Research Scientist in the laboratory of Nita Ahuja, MD, MBA, FACS, is the recipient of a $50,000 grant from the Ron Foley Foundation, Inc.

Mathieu Bakhoum, MD, PhD, has been named one of the 12 members of the NCI Early-Stage Surgeon Scientist Program for 2022.

The Mark Foundation for Cancer Research has selected four scientific research projects to receive $12 million in funding for its 2022 Endeavor Awards. Nikhil Joshi, PhD and Aaron Ring, MD, PhD, are part of a five person team.

Valentina Greco, PhD, has been elected vice president of the International Society for Stem Cell Research (ISSCR).

Ian Krop, MD, PhD, received $50,000 from the Heley Family Breast Cancer Research Fund to support his clinical and translational research program.

Rachel Perry, PhD, has received an R01 from the National Cancer Institute with a conversation to a seven-year R37 to study, “Defining the Role of Renal Gluconeogenesis in Renal Cell Carcinoma.” Adebowale Adeniran, MD, Professor of Pathology and Director of Cytopathology, is co-investigator on the grant.

Ranjit Bindra, MD, PhD, will serve as the The National Brain Tumor Society DNA Damage Response consortium’s principal investigator.

Chrystal Starbird, PhD, postdoctoral associate at the Yale Cancer Biology Institute, has received a Postdoctoral Career Transition Award under the Maximizing Opportunities for Scientific and Academic Independent Careers (MOSAIC) program, part of the National Institutes of Health's effort to enhance diversity within the academic biomedical research workforce.

Maryam Lustberg, MD, MPH, will present at the 31st Annual Interdisciplinary Breast Center Conference.

Akiko Iwasaki, PhD, has been appointed Sterling Professor of Immunobiology and of Molecular, Cellular & Developmental Biology.

8 newly elected members into the Connecticut Academy of Science and Engineering (CASE): Anton M. Bennett, PhD, Susan Busch, PhD, Lieping Chen, MD, PhD, Amy Justice, MD, PhD, Valentino Greco, PhD, Brian Smith, MD, Marcella NunezSmith, MD, MHS, and Yajaira Suarez, PhD.

February 2022

Maryam Lustberg, MD, MPH, has been named co-editor of the journal Cancer Medicine.

Roy S. Herbst, MD, PhD, will present the Keynote Lecture at the 2022 Targeted Therapies of Lung Cancer (TTLC) Meeting.

Andrew Goodman, PhD, has been named a Fellow of the American Academy of Microbiology.

Smita Krishnaswamy, PhD, was awarded the National Science Foundation CAREER Award, as well as a Sloan Research Fellowship.

Lauren A. Baldassarre, MD, FACC, FSCMR, has been elected to the Society for Cardiovascular Magnetic Resonance (SCMR) Board of Trustees.

The Paul G. Allen Frontiers Group has named Grace Chen, PhD, and Joseph Craft, MD, as Allen Distinguished Investigators.

Roy S. Herbst, MD, PhD, Appointed Deputy Director for Clinical Affairs and Assistant Dean for Translational Research

Annual Award Winners Celebrated at Virtual Conclave:

Richard Edelson, MD, was presented with the Yale Cancer Center Lifetime Achievement Award

Yale Cancer Center Awards for Excellence in Clinical Care were presented to Nikolai Podoltsev, MD, PhD, and Jennifer Moliterno, MD, FAANS

The Ruth McCorkle Oncology Advanced Practice Provider Award was presented to Carol Staugaard, APRN-BC

Faye Rogers, PhD, was awarded the Yale Cancer Center Award for Leadership in Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion

Yale Cancer Center Award for Mentorship Excellence was presented to Alfred Lee, MD, PhD

Class of 1961 Cancer Research Awards were presented to Rong Fan, PhD, and Shangqin Guo, PhD

Yale Cancer Center Population Science Research Prize was presented to Elizabeth Claus, PhD, MD

Yale Cancer Center Translational Science Research Prize was presented to Faye Rogers, PhD

The Yale Cancer Center Clinical Science Research Prize was awarded to Lajos Pusztai, MD

The Yale Cancer Center Basic Science Research Prizes were presented to Marcus Bosenberg, MD, PhD, and Qin Yan, PhD

Cary Gross, MD, has been named Associate Editor of JAMA Internal Medicine.

Donald Engelman, PhD, has been named a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), the world’s largest general scientific society.

Terri Parker, MD, has been named Co-Chair of the ClinicalPath (formerly Via Oncology) Multiple Myeloma Committee.

Lisa Fucito, PhD, has been elected to the Board of Directors of the Society for Research on Nicotine and Tobacco.

January 2022

Gilda’s Club Westchester has honored D. Barry Boyd, MD, MS, with the inaugural Spirit of Excellence in Oncology Award for his incredible contributions to the field of oncology.

We are proud to announce that four 2021 Young Investigator Award winners were selected by the American Journal of Hematology (AJH) in recognition of their study, “Intermediate-dose anticoagulation, aspirin, and in-hospital mortality in COVID-19: a propensity score-matched analysis.” George Goshua, MD, Matthew Meizlish, MPhil, Rebecca Fine, MD, and Yiwen Liu, MS, of Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, were honored as first authors of the publication based on the scientific quality and originality of the work.
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Aileen Fernandez, PhD, a postdoctoral fellow in the laboratory of David Rimm, MD, PhD, in the Department of Pathology, was awarded a travel grant to attend the Society for Immunotherapy of Cancer's Cancer Immunotherapy Winter School 2022.

Elizabeth Prsic, MD, has been named a Panel Member for the Clinical Practice Guidelines on Adult Cancer Pain for the National Comprehensive Cancer Network.

Janie Zhang, MD, received a 2022 ASCO Foundation Conquer Cancer Award in recognition of her abstract at ASCO GI, Clinical Significance and Biomarker Potential of MGMT Protein Measurement in Colorectal Cancer.

Maryam Lustberg, MD, MPH, has co-edited Diagnosis, Management and Emerging Strategies for Chemotherapy-Induced Neuropathy.
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Mehra Golshan, MD, MBA, presented on Innovative Image Guided Breast Surgery: Intraoperative MRI, Mass Spec and Beyond at the 14th Breast- Gynecological & Immunooncology International Cancer Conference earlier this week from Cairo, Egypt.

Elena Ratner, MD, and Stanton Honig, MD, shared their expertise and presented on Sexuality, Intimacy and Menopause for Cancer Survivors and Fertility in the Oncologic Patient last week during an International CME meeting on Survivorship and Cancer Control: Raising the Goals and Optimizing Care Forum hosted from Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. In addition, Mehra Golshan, MD, MBA, served on the scientific committee for the program, as moderator, and as a presenter on Management of Chronic Symptoms and Complications Post Breast Cancer Surgery.

The leadership of Yale Cancer Center has selected Rong Fan, PhD and Shangqin Guo, PhD, as the recipients of the Class of ‘61 Cancer Research Awards for 2021.

David Braun, MD, PhD, has been selected as the recipient of the Spatial Multiomics Grant Award-CODEX from Akoya Biosciences to support his lab’s research to understand what features of the tumor-immune microenvironment impact response or resistance to current immunotherapy for kidney cancer.

Nikhil Joshi, PhD, has been recognized by The Mark Foundation for Cancer Research with their 2022 Emerging Leader Award.

The American Cancer Society has awarded Yale Cancer Center new supplemental funding to support a Diversity in Research Internship Program led by Joseph Contessa, MD, PhD and Faye Rogers, PhD.

December 2021

Sanjay Aneja, MD, has received the 2022 William O. Seery Clinical Investigator Grant from the Patterson Trust Foundation. The grant is to support implementation of Dr. Aneja’s research on deep learning derived imaging biomarkers for lung cancer.

Rong Fan, PhD, has been elected as a Fellow of the National Academy of Inventors (NAI). Dr. Fan was one of 164 inventors named 2021 NAI fellows by the organization, which annually recognizes the spirit of innovation in creating outstanding inventions.
Congratulations to our 2022 Lion Heart Grant awardees, Mariya Rozenblit, MD, and Judit Jimenez Sainz, PhD.

Nancy Ruddle, PhD, has been named a 2022 Distinguished Fellow of the American Association of Immunologists (AAI).

Four Yale Cancer Center faculty have been appointed to endowed professorships by the Yale University Corporation this month. Congratulations to Ranjit Bindra, MD, PhD, Stephanie Halene, MD, PhD, Suchitra Krishnan-Sarin, PhD, and David Rimm, MD, PhD.

Stacey Stein, MD, has been selected to participate in the Yale New Haven Health Institute of Excellence 2021-22 Lean in Circle.

Eric Song, a sixth-year MD/PhD student in the laboratory of Akiko Iwasaki, PhD, is a member of this year’s STAT Wunderkinds cohort.

Prasanna Ananth, MD, MPH, has been elected to membership in the Society for Pediatric Research.

Sajid A. Khan, MD, has been appointed to the editorial board in the Translational Research Section of the Annals of Surgical Oncology.

Aaron Ring, MD, PhD, has been named to Nature Biotechnology's list of "Top 20 Translational Researchers of 2020," which recognizes success in patenting.

Patricia LoRusso, DO, has been named Chair of the American Association for Cancer Research (AACR) KRAS Task Force to lead the AACR KRAS Symposium in 2022.

Valentina Greco, PhD, is president-elect of the Society for Investigative Dermatology for 2021-22.

Caro Kravitz, a fourth-year graduate student in the laboratory of Don Nguyen, PhD, has been awarded a F31 grant to support her project, “Determining the Molecular Contributions of KDM2A in NSCLC Metastasis.”

Matt Murray, a fourth-year PhD candidate in the laboratory of Ranjit Bindra, MD, PhD, has been awarded a F31 Diversity Grant to support a collaborative project with the laboratory of W. Mark Saltzman, PhD, to study gliomas.

The Institute for Scientific Information has named 26 Yale School of Medicine faculty members, including 15 members from Yale Cancer Center:
Craig Crews, PhD, Lieping Chen, MD, PhD, Mark Gerstein, Scott Gettinger, MD, Andrew Goodman, PhD, David A. Hafler, MD, FANA, Roy S. Herbst, MD, PhD, Silvio Inzucchi, MD, Akiko Iwasaki, PhD, Suchitra Krishnan-Sarin, PhD, Ruslan Medzhitov, PhD, David Rimm, MD, PhD, Gerald Shulman, MD, PhD, and Mario Sznol, MD.

November 2021

Yale Cancer Center has renewed its American Cancer Society Institutional Research Grant. The grant is led by Daniel DiMaio, MD, PhD.

Lieping Chen, MD, PhD, has been named an inaugural Fellow of the Academy of Immuno-Oncology by the Society for Immunotherapy of Cancer.

Nicole Deziel, PhD, MHS, has been awarded an American Cancer Society Research Scholar Grant to fund her project, “Thyroid Hormone Disrupting Chemicals and Pediatric Thyroid Cancer.”

Murat Gunel, MD, received the WINN Award at the meeting of the Society of Neurological Surgeons last month in Austin, Texas.

Roy S. Herbst, MD, PhD, participated in the EI 2021! Conference and presented along with Robin Stern, Associate Director for the Yale Center for Emotional Intelligence, on “Emotional Intelligence is the Rx.”

Dwain Fehon, PsyD, recently chaired and moderated an international panel presentation for the International Psycho-oncology Society.

October 2021

Marcella Nunez-Smith, MD, MHS, had been elected to the National Academy of Medicine.

Kaelyn Sumigray, PhD, has received an American Cancer Society Research Scholar Award to support her research grant, “Epithelial-stromal interactions in intestinal polyposis.”

Ranjit Bindra, MD, PhD, has been awarded a $750,000 grant from the Gateway Foundation for Cancer Research.

Women Leaders in Oncology (WLO) has named Pamela Kunz, MD, the 2021 Woman Oncologist of the Year.

The National Cancer Institute (NCI) has recognized Markus Müschen, MD, PhD, with its Outstanding Investigator Award. The award supports scientists with outstanding records of productivity and innovation and provides more than $7 million in funding over seven years for groundbreaking cancer research.

Elizabeth Berger, MD, has been named a prestigious Michael Zinner Health Services Research Fellow by the Surgical Outcomes Club.

The National Cancer Institute has announced a U19 cooperative grant to establish a Glioblastoma Therapeutics Network (GTN) to work collaboratively to develop new treatments for adult glioblastoma. Antonio Omuro, MD, and Ranjit Bindra, MD, PhD, Professor of Therapeutic Radiology, are Principal Investigators for the U19 and the associated grant, "Center of Innovation for Brain Tumor Therapeutics."

Congratulations to Daniel Petrylak, MD, appointed Vice Chairman of the SWOG Cancer Research Network Genitourinary Committee.

Xavier Llor, MD, PhD, and Erin Hofstatter, MD, have published a book, “Cancer Genetics: A Clinical Approach,” with the expertise of many Yale Cancer Center members. The text is available online.

Sabrina Browning, MD, has been appointed to serve as the faculty representative for the faculty divisions of Yale Cancer Center to the Dean’s Advisory Council from November 2021 to October 2024.

The Yale Surgery Citizen Awards Committee has named Ronald Salem, MD, FACS, MBChB, the 2022 recipient of The Dr. Walter E. Longo MD Award. Established in 2019, the award recognizes one faculty member per year who has made a significant positive influence on the cultural legacy of the Department of Surgery.

Nita Ahuja, MD, MBA, has been appointed Chair-Elect of the Council of Faculty and Academic Societies (CFAS) for the Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC).

Elizabeth Claus, PhD, MD, has been awarded a U2C grant from the National Cancer Institute to support her proposal, “OPTimIzing engageMent in discovery of molecular evolution of low grade glioma (OPTIMUM).”

Michael Cecchini, MD, has been awarded a K08 Career Development Award to support his research and development of two investigator-initiated early phase clinical trials for patients with colorectal cancer under the mentorship of Patricia LoRusso, DO.

Stacey Stein, MD, has been appointed Assistant Medical Director of the Clinical Trials Office.

Neal Fischbach, MD, has been appointed to Assistant Medical Director of the Clinical Trials Office for the Care Center Network.

September 2021

Lynn D. Wilson, MD, MPH, has been appointed Deputy Chief Medical Officer for Radiation Oncology.

Suchitra Krishnan-Sarin, PhD, has been appointed to serve on the steering committee of the new American Association for Cancer Research Cancer Prevention Working Group, which is dedicated to supporting cancer prevention research.

Edward Kaftan, PhD, has been appointed Associate Cancer Center Director for Research Affairs

The inaugural awardees of the JH Milstone Fund are Matthew McConnell, MD, and Sean Gu, MD/PhD.

Navid Hafez, MD, MPH, has been awarded a Bristol Myers Squibb Foundation/National Medical Fellowships Diversity in Clinical Trials Career Development Program (BMSF DCTCDP) Award through the American Association of Cancer Research.

Mehra Golshan, MD, MBA, has been appointed as Executive Vice Chair of Operations for the Department of Surgery.

Maryam Lustberg, MD, MPH, presented at a Breast Cancer Education Tumor Board Program for colleagues in Latin America on Quality of life in Patients with Metastatic Breast Cancer.

R. Peter Manes, MD, has been appointed as Medical Director for Ambulatory Operations for the Department of Surgery.

August 2021

The Breast Cancer Research Foundation has awarded Mehra Golshan, MD, MBA, funding to support “Reducing Re-excisions for Breast Conserving Therapy.” In addition, Lajos Pusztai, MD, DPhil, has received an award from the BCRF to fund “Characterization of Intra-tumor Heterogeneity and Immune Infiltration in Breast Cancer and its Clinical Implications.”

Stephanie Halene, MD, PhD, and Jeffrey Ishizuka, MD, DPhil (Co-PI), have been awarded a grant from the Edward P. Evans Foundation to research the m6A writer METTL3 in the treatment of myelodysplastic syndromes by harnessing the activation of the immune response induced by double-stranded RNA formation.

Kelsey Martin, MD, has been invited to participate in the American Society of Hematology 2021 Class of the Medical Educators Institute (MEI).

Karl L. Insogna, M D, is the 2021 recipient of the Frederic C. Bartter Award from the American Society for Bone and Mineral Research (ASBMR).

The Yale SPORE in Lung Cancer recently announced the recipients of the 2021 Career Enhancement Program and Developmental Research Program Award cycles of funding. These awards aim to educate the next generation of investigators committed to translational research in lung cancer. View awardees here>>

Jeffrey Townsend, PhD, has been appointed as the inaugural Co-Chair Elect of the American Association for Cancer Research’s (AACR) new Working Group on Cancer Evolution.

Maryam Lustberg, MD, MPH, has been appointed Co-Chair of the Alliance for Clinical Trials in Oncology Symptom Intervention Committee, along with Kathryn Ruddy, MD of the Mayo Clinic.

Juan Vasquez, MD, has received a NIH/NCI K08 Career Development Grant. The award is for 5 years with approximately $214,000 in direct costs per year to fund his project is titled “Targeting the DNA damage response with PARP and ATR inhibition to potentiate cytotoxicity and improve efficacy of immune checkpoint blockade in IDH mutant gliomas.”

Ellen F. Foxman, MD, PhD, has been named a 2021 Rita Allen Foundation Scholar.

Congratulations to Yanixa Quinones-Aviles, a PhD student in the lab of Mandar Muzumdar, MD, who was recently awarded an F31 fellowship from the NCI. Her topic of research will be "Differential pathway engagement and the biological consequences of KRAS variants in cancer."

George Goshua, MD, a third-year hematology fellow at Yale, has been selected as the recipient of Yale Cancer Center’s Forget Scholar for 2021.

The Center for Community Engagement and Health Equity (Director: Marcella Nunez-Smith) has selected four YCC investigators to be funded to take part in the year-long “Foundations of Community-Engaged Research” course offered through the National Clinician Scholars Program. Congratulations to: Cecelia Calhoun, MD, MPHS, MBA; Henry S. Park, MD, MPH; Anna Arnal Estapé, PhD; Raiza Rossi, MD


July 2021

Joseph W. Kim, MD, has received a 2021 Cancer Clinical Investigator Team Leadership Award (CCITLA) from the National Cancer Institute.

Qin Yan, PhD has received a Breakthrough Award from the Department of Defense to fund his research on “Targeting a Bromodomain Protein CECR2 in Breast Cancer.”

The Harrington Discovery Institute has named Joseph Contessa, MD, PhD, one of eight Harrington Scholar-Innovators for 2021.

Congratulations to Scott Huntington, MD, MPH, MSc, and Natalia Neparidze, MD, on their recent promotions to Associate Professor of Medicine (Hematology).

Dmitry Kozhevnikov, DO, has been promoted to Director of Outpatient Palliative Care.

Jun Deng, PhD, has been named a Fellow of ASTRO (FASTRO) in recognition of his significant service to ASTRO and his contributions to the field of radiation oncology.

Joyce Chung, MD, MS, Christin Knowlton, MD, MA, and Bruce McGibbon, MD, have all been promoted to the rank of Associate Professor of Clinical Therapeutic Radiology.

Tim Wartewig, MD, PhD, a postdoctoral associate in the Center for Molecular and Cellular Oncology under Dr. Markus Müschen, has been awarded an CRI Irvington Postdoctoral Fellowship by the Cancer Research Institute.

Sabrina Browning, MD, has been promoted to Assistant Professor of Medicine (Hematology).

Jennifer Miller, PhD, has received a grant from Susan G. Komen to build and pilot a new tool to help improve transparency and representativeness of U.S. breast cancer patients in breast cancer clinical trials.

Thiruvengadam Muniraj, MD, has been inducted as a Fellow of the Royal College of Physicians (RCP). RCP is the oldest medical college in England, often playing a pivotal role in raising standards and shaping public health.

June 2021

Barbara Burtness, MD, had been appointed Interim Associate Cancer Center Director for Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion.

Marcus Bosenberg, MD, PhD, has been named Inaugural Director of Yale Center for Immuno-Oncology.

Marcella Nunez-Smith, MD, MPH, has been appointed the C.N.H. Long Professor of Medicine and Epidemiology.

Ranjit Bindra, MD, PhD, has been named to the New Haven Biz Power 25 leaders list in healthcare for 2021 in recognition of his research leading to new cancer treatments and entrepreneurial leadership.

Morgan Levine, PhD, is the recipient of the 2021 Vincent Cristofalo Rising Star Award given by the American Federation for Aging Research.

Roy S. Herbst, MD, PhD, was selected as one of 25 scientific and advocacy leaders spotlighted in recognition of the 25th anniversary of Friends of Cancer Research.

John Wysolmerski, MD, has been appointed Section Chief for Endocrinology & Metabolism in the Department of Internal Medicine.

Rachel Greenup, MD, MPH, has received a 2021 National Endowment for Plastic Surgery Grant from the Plastic Surgery Foundation to fund her research on shared decision making for breast reconstruction.

Suzanne B. Evans, MD, MPH, has been promoted to Professor of Therapeutic Radiology.

Noffar Bar, MD, and Kelsey Martin, MD, have been selected to participate in the 2021-22 Medical Education Fellowship at Yale School of Medicine.

Jun Deng, PhD, will give the keynote speech on “Digital Twin Modeling of Cancer Patients” at the upcoming Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) International Conference on Computational Intelligence and Virtual Environments for Measurement Systems and Applications.

Xavier Llor, MD, PhD, has been appointed Vice-Chair for the Colorectal Cancer Screening Guidelines Panel of the National Comprehensive Cancer Network (NCCN).

Pamela Kunz, MD, has been appointed as the Journal of Clinical Oncology Consultant Editor for Meeting Proceedings.

The Bristol Myers Squibb Foundation Diversity in Clinical Trials Career Development Program, in collaboration with the American Association for Cancer Research and the National Medical Fellowships, and co-directed by Roy S. Herbst, MD, PhD, has announced its faculty for the inaugural program: Alfred Lee, MD, PhD, and Patricia LoRusso, DO, will participate in the program, along with Eric Velazquez, MD.

May 2021

Iris Isufi, MD, has been promoted to Associate Professor of Medicine (Hematology).

Vincent T. DeVita, Jr., MD, has been named to the Honorary Host Committee of the Nixon National Cancer Conference.

Joan A. Steitz, PhD, is one of two recipients of the 2021 Warren Alpert Foundation Prize, which recognizes people whose scientific achievements have led to the prevention, cure or treatment of human diseases or disorders, and/or whose research constitutes a seminal scientific finding that holds great promise of ultimately changing our understanding of or ability to treat disease.

Congratulations to Ruth Halaban, PhD, on receiving a Melanoma Research Alliance Established Investigator Award to research targeted therapy of melanoma with LZTR1 and CRKL inhibitors.

Lilian Kabeche, PhD, and Sidi Chen, PhD, have each been awarded the 2021 Pershing Square Sohn Prize for Young Investigators in Cancer Research, a prestigious award from the Pershing Square Sohn Cancer Research Alliance.

Congratulations to Barbara Burtness, MD, on her appointment as Chair of the Task Force on Advancement for Women for the ECOG-ACRIN Oncology Research Group.

Shalin Kothari, MD, has been named to the Lymphoma Research Foundation’s Mantle Cell Lymphoma Consortium (MCLC).

Lieping Chen, MD, PhD, has been appointed as a visiting professor of cancer immunotherapy by the Oxford Branch of the Ludwig Institute for Cancer Research.

The winners of this year’s Fourth Annual Yale Cancer Center Trainee Colloquium Research Excellence Prize Awards: Camila Robles-Oteiza, PhD Candidate, Immunobiology, Mentor: Katerina Politi, PhD; Talib Dosani, MD, Clinical Fellow, Hematology/Medical Oncology, Mentor: Michal Rose, MD; Ryan Chow, MD-PhD Candidate, Genetics, Mentor: Sidi Chen, PhD; Can Cui, PhD Candidate, Immunobiology, Mentors: Nikhil Joshi, PhD, and Joseph Craft, MD

Three Yale Cancer Center members were awarded 2021 Blavatnik Awards during an award ceremony at the Yale Innovation Summit: Demetrios Braddock, MD, PhD, Joseph Contessa, MD, PhD, and Faye Rogers, PhD.

Julia Foldi, MD, Mariya Rozenblit, MD, and Janie Zhang, MD, fellows in the hematology/medical oncology fellowship program, have been accepted to the 2021 ASCO/AACR Methods in Clinical Cancer Research Workshop

Jill Lacy, MD, and Ronald Salem, MD, FACS have been awarded Yale Medicine Distinguished Clinical Career Awards.

Nancy H. Ruddle, PhD, has been selected as the 2021 recipient of the Connecticut Medal of Science.

Congratulations to the 2021 recipients of the DeLuca Center for Innovation in Hematology Research Pilot Grants: Lai (Linda) Chan, PhD -Leveraging pathway interference for therapeutic benefit in B-cell malignancies; Francine Foss, MD and Markus Müschen, MD, PhD- Targeting SYK as a central driver of oncogenic TCR-signaling in peripheral T-cell lymphomas; Karla Neugebauer, PhD and Manoj Pillai, MBBS- Single molecule analysis of co-transcriptional RNA processing defects in Myelodysplastic Syndrome (MDS) driven by mutations in splicing factors

Maryam Lustberg, MD, MPH, has received a grant from the Alliance for Clinical Trials in Oncology to support her proposal, “PIN ALLIANCE: Power in Numbers using Harmonized GWAS and Toxicity Data.”

Anees Chagpar, MD, MBA, MPH, FACS, FRCS(C) was named a Fellow of the American Society of Clinical Oncology (FASCO).

Amer Zeidan, MBBS, received a UM1 Supplement, in collaboration with Dr. Jerald Radich at Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center to support their proposal, “Serial monitoring of circulating cell-free tumor DNA as measured by duplex sequencing in older patients with acute myeloid leukemia who receive azacitidine+venetoclax +/- immune checkpoint blockade.”

Thomas Prebet, MD, PhD, received a UM1 Supplement to fund his research project, “Integration of single cell sequencing as a biomarker of PARP inhibitor response for IDH1 and IDH2 mutated AML and MDS.”

April 2021

Lieping Chen, MD, PhD, was elected to the Prestigious National Academy of Sciences, one of the highest honors in the scientific field.

Jill Lacy, MD, was named a Fellow of the American Society of Clinical Oncology (FASCO).

Jennifer Kapo, MD, was honored with the 2021 President’s Award from the Connecticut Coalition to Improve End-of-Life Care.

Rachel Perry, PhD, has been awarded the Merck-MRA Young Investigator Award from the Melanoma Research Alliance to fund her work on “Mitochondrial Uncoupling: A New Therapeutic Approach for Melanoma.”

Pamela Kunz, MD, has been appointed Vice Chief of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion for the Section of Medical Oncology to help guide the Office of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion in Internal Medicine.

Two members of Yale Cancer Center are newly elected members of the American Academy of Arts & Sciences. Congratulations to Ronald R. Breaker, PhD, and Akiko Iwasaki, PhD.

Frank Buono, PhD, has been awarded the Children's Tumor Foundation Clinical Research Award.

Nikolai Podoltsev, MD, PhD, and Xiaomei Ma, PhD, have received a generous three-year award from The Frederick A. DeLuca Foundation. Other collaborators include Caroline Johnson, PhD, Andrew DeWan, PhD, MPH, and Rong Wang, PhD.

Jun Deng, PhD, has received a multi-institutional collaborative research grant by the Department of Energy.

Michaela Dinan, PhD, has been awarded a Research Scholar Grant from the American Cancer Society to fund her research project, “Development of Cancer Survivorship Risk Models to Inform Pathways of Care.”

En Cheng, MD, MSPH, received a AACR-AbbVie Scholar in Training Award in recognition of his abstract at AACR, “Survival for patients with early-onset colorectal cancer – An overall survival analysis from the National Cancer Database, 2004-2015.”

Lieping Chen, MD, PhD, has been elected as a Fellow of the American Association for Cancer Research (AACR) Academy. Dr. Chen joins two other current Yale Cancer Center members of the Academy: Vincent T. DeVita, Jr., MD, and Joseph Schlessinger, PhD.

Anne Chiang, MD, PhD, has been appointed an Executive Officer for SWOG and will now oversee their portfolio of clinical trials in lung and breast cancers.

Prasanna Ananth, MD, MPH, has been awarded a K08 Career Development Award from the National Cancer Institute to support her research project, “The Pediatric Advanced Cancer Experience (PACE): Measuring Quality of End-of-Life Care for Children with Cancer.”

March 2021

Tara Sanft, MD, has been named Chair of the National Comprehensive Cancer Network (NCCN) Survivorship Committee.

Roy Herbst, MD, PhD, has been appointed to the National Cancer Policy Forum representing the American Association for Cancer Research.

Eight Yale Cancer Center members have been elected to the Connecticut Academy of Science and Engineering (CASE) for 2021. Congratulations to Gary Desir, MD, Rong Fan, PhD, Antonio Giraldez, PhD, Mark W. Hochstrasser, PhD, Melinda L. Irwin, PhD, MPH, Chen Liu, MD, PhD, Linda M. Niccolai, PhD, and Hongyu Zhao, PhD.

Iris Isufi, MD, has been appointed Vice Chief of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion for the Section of Hematology to help guide the Office of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion in Internal Medicine.

Laura J. Morrison, MD, FAAHPM, has received the 2021 American Academy of Hospice and Palliative Medicine (AAHPM) Gerald H. Holman Distinguished Service Award in recognition of her important contributions to the national Entrustable Professional Activities (EPAs) and Curricular Milestones Workgroup that created and published EPAs and Curricular Milestones for hospice and palliative medicine fellowship programs.

Vish Muthusamy, PhD, has received a grant from Cybrexa Therapeutics to support research on “Investigating the anti-tumor activity of CBX-12 in combination with checkpoint inhibitors in syngeneic mouse tumor models” and a second grant from Enlivex Therapeutics for “Investigating the anti-tumor activity of Allocetra in combination with checkpoint inhibitors in syngeneic mouse tumor models.”

Eric Song, a fifth-year Yale School of Medicine (YSM) MD-PhD student, under the mentorship of Akiko Iwasaki, PhD, is one of 13 recipients of the prestigious 2021 Harold M. Weintraub Graduate Student Award.

February 2021

Joan Steitz, PhD, has been named a Wolf Prize Laureate in Medicine for 2021 by the Israel-based Wolf Foundation.

Barbara Burtness, MD, will co-chair the NCI Clinical Trial Planning Meeting on TP53 Mutated Head and Neck Cancer this weekend.

Craig Crews, PhD, has been awarded the Scheele Award from the Swedish Pharmaceutical Society in recognition of excellence in drug development and discovery.

Prasanna Ananth, MD, MPH, has received an award for submitting one of the Top Scoring Abstracts for the 2021 National Comprehensive Cancer Network (NCCN) Virtual Annual Conference.

Smita Krishnaswamy, PhD, has been awarded a two-year, $75,000 Sloan Research Fellowship to advance her work.

Congratulations to Wajih Kidwai, MD, FACP, promoted to Associate Professor of Clinical Medicine (Medical Oncology), Kert Sabbath, MD, FACP, promoted to Associate Professor of Clinical Medicine (Medical Oncology), and Robert Legare, MD, FACP, who has been appointed to Associate Professor of Clinical Medicine (Medical Oncology).

The Bristol Myers Squibb Foundation Diversity in Clinical Trials Career Development Program (BMSF DCTCDP) has announced its National Advisory Committee (NAC) Members, including Yale Cancer Center’s Roy S. Herbst, MD, PhD.

Valentina Greco, PhD, has received the 2021 Momentum Award from the International Society for Stem Cell Research, which recognizes the exceptional achievements of an investigator whose innovative research has established a major area of stem cell-related research with a strong trajectory for future success.

The Leukemia & Lymphoma Society highlighted Amer Zeidan, MBBS, as a “trailblazing researcher” in their 2020 Annual Report for contributing to unstoppable research during a challenging year.

Ranjit Bindra, MD, PhD, has received a grant for $150,000 from The Andrew McDonough B+ Foundation to support his team’s research on targeting NAD metabolism in pediatric brain tumors.

Stephanie Halene, MD, PhD, was awarded a 2-year, $250,000/year grant by the Vera and Joseph Dresner Foundation entitled “Exploiting DNA repair defects in IDH mutant MDS via combination therapies."

January 2021

Jun Deng, PhD, DABR, FAAPM, FInstP, has been awarded a multi-institutional collaborative project entitled “Dynamic Multiscale Digital Twin for a Lung Cancer Patient” from the National Cancer Institute in December 2020.

Chrystal Starbird, PhD, a postdoc in the Cancer Biology Institute laboratory of Kathryn Ferguson, PhD, has won one of the inaugural Rising Black Scientist Awards from CellPress. Her winning essay will be published in the February 18, 2021 issue of Cell.
Yimeng Gao, PhD, has been selected by the American Society of Hematology to receive a Scholar Award to study hematopoietic development and RNA m6A modification.

Mark Lemmon, PhD, FRS, has been named Chair of the Editorial Board for the Biochemical Journal.

Luisa F. Escobar-Hoyos, PhD, and Mandar D. Muzumdar, MD, have been selected as 2021 recipients of the Damon Runyon-Rachleff Innovation Award.

Sajid Khan, MD, Associate Professor of Surgery (Oncology), has been awarded the Bridgeport Hospital Platinum Quality Award in recognition of the time, hard work, and dedication placed into caring for our patients.

Joseph Vinetz, MD, Professor of Medicine (Infectious Diseases), and Geoffrey Chupp, MD, Professor of Medicine (Pulmonary), have been awarded the 2020 Ken Griffin-Prostate Cancer Foundation Special Challenge Award.

December 2020

Roy S. Herbst, MD, PhD, has been selected as the 2020 Clinical Research Award recipient by the Association of Community Cancer Centers (ACCC) for significantly and positively impacting oncology patients, their families, and the broader oncology community.

Marcella Nunez-Smith, MD, MHS, a co-chair of President-elect Biden’s COVID-19 advisory board, will also lead a new White House task force dedicated to health equity.

Sabrina Browning, MD, Instructor of Medicine (Hematology), has been selected as the recipient of Yale Cancer Center’s Forget Scholar for 2020.

Carrie Redlich, MD, MPH, Professor of Medicine (Occupational Medicine) and of Environmental Health Sciences, has received the 2020 Harriet Hardy Award presented by New England College of Occupational and Environmental Medicine (NECOEM). Dr. Redlich gave her award lecture presentation on December 3 to the NECOEM annual conference. It was titled The Changing Landscape of Work-related Lung Diseases.

James Hansen, MD, Associate Professor of Therapeutic Radiology, was recently awarded two grants to support his research, including a Breast Cancer Research Program Breakthrough Award from the Department of Defense for use of a modified autoantibody against breast cancer brain metastases and a NIH NINDS R01 grant for targeting glioblastoma with a nuclear-penetrating anti-DNA antibody.

Jean L. Bolognia, MD, Professor of Dermatology, is one of six people who have been named 2020 Giants of Dermatology by Dermatology Times. The program recognizes leading physicians and researchers in the field of dermatology whose landmark successes, ongoing inspiration, and career-long dedication redefine what is possible for this specialty.

Congratulations to YCC members Joseph Contessa, MD, PhD, Ranjit Bindra, MD, PhD, and W. Mark Saltzman, MD, PhD, for receiving top cash awards at this year’s Yale Lifesciences PitchFest 2020.

Nina Kadan-Lottick, MD, MSPH, was appointed to the Executive Committee of the NCI-funded Children’s Oncology Group, which is responsible for strategic planning, resource allocation, performance monitoring, review of the Operations Office and the Statistics and Data Management Center.

Roy S. Herbst, MD, PhD, presented at the Stand Up To Cancer Innovation Summit on Lung Cancer Health Equity yesterday highlighting Challenges in Health Equity in Innovative Clinical Trials.

Dr. Prajwal Boddu, was awarded a pilot grant from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) NIDDK Cooperative Centers of Excellence in Hematology to investigate mechanisms by which novel protein isoforms of Mitoferrin 1 regulate iron delivery during erythroid maturation.

Sanjay Aneja, MD, has been named an Associate Editor for the Journal of Clinical Oncology – Clinical Cancer Informatics.

Roy S. Herbst, MD, PhD, will present during the Best of ASCO Africa 2020.

November 2020

Marcella Nunez-Smith, MD, MHS, has been named Co-Chair of President-Elect Joe Biden’s Transition COVID-19 Advisory Board.

Marianne Davies, DNP, MSN, RN, APRN, CNS-BC, ACNP-BC, AOCNP, FAAN, was inducted as a Fellow into the American Academy of Nursing (FAAN). The FAAN is one of the highest awards for nursing.

George Goshua, MD, was selected as the Emergency Department’s Consultant of the Month to celebrate his compassion, professionalism, and teamwork with the ED staff.

Xavier Llor, MD, PhD, and Marcella Nunez-Smith, MD, MHS, will present at the National Colorectal Cancer Roundtable 80% in Every Community Conference on November 16 and 17.

October 2020

Sanjay Aneja, MD, and his team won the Abstract Award for Neuro-Imaging at this year’s Society for Neuro-Oncology Conference for “Deep Learning Survival Analysis for Multiple Brain Metastases.” The first author is Enoch Chang, BS, a Yale Medical Student studying in his lab.

Stavroula Hatzios, PhD, received a "Conquer Cancer Now" Award from the Concern Foundation for her project, “Connecting Cysteine Oxidation to Cancer Cell Signaling in Infection-associated Cancers.”

Craig Crews, PhD, has been awarded the 2020 Heinrich Wieland Prize from the Boehringer Ingelheim Foundation in recognition of his research on PROTACS and proteasome inhibitor therapies.
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Sidi Chen, PhD, has been awarded a $500,000 research grant from Alliance for Cancer Gene Therapy (ACGT) to advance Multiplexed Activation of Endogenous Genes as an Immunotherapy or MAEGI technology.
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The National Institutes of Health has awarded a Research Project Cooperative Agreement Grant to Yale Cancer Center. The 2-year, $1.4 million U01 award, led by Stephanie Halene, MD, PhD, and Rong Fan, PhD, will fund immuno-serological assays for monitoring COVID-19 in patients with hematologic malignancies.

Robert Legare, MD, has been selected as the recipient of the 2020 Dr. Joseph DiMase Memorial Healthcare Professional Award. Dr. Legare has always been a champion for promoting cancer prevention, improving detection, increasing access to health and social services and overall reduction in the burden of cancer on patients, he embodies the essence of this award.

The Yale Surgery Citizen Awards Committee has named Nina Horowitz, MD, the inaugural recipient of The Dr. Walter E. Longo MD Award.

Megan C. King, PhD, has been named an Allen Distinguished Investigator by the Paul G. Allen Frontiers Group, a division of the Allen Institute.

Timil Patel, MD, was selected for the 2020/2021 FDA-AACR Oncology Educational Fellowship.

The Yale SPORE in Lung Cancer has awarded the 2020 Career Enhancement Program and Developmental Research Program Awards. These awards aim to educate the next generation of investigators committed to translational research in lung cancer and support studies with a strong translational component. Awardees are as follows:

Career Enhancement Program:
Sanjay Aneja, MD, Assistant Professor of Therapeutic Radiology | Deriving Imaging Based Biomarkers for Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer using Deep Learning
Mentors: Harlan Krumholz, Roy S. Herbst

Luisa Escobar-Hoyos, PhD, MSc, Assistant Professor of Therapeutic Radiology | RNA splicing as a novel therapeutic target in lung cancers with mutant p53
Mentors: Katerina Politi, Sarah Goldberg

Michael Hurwitz, PhD, MD, Assistant Professor of Medicine (Medical Oncology) | Expansion and Activation of TIL from NSCLC
Mentors: Scott Gettinger, Diane Krauss

Rachel Perry, PhD, BS, Assistant Professor, Medicine/Endocrinology and Cellular & Molecular Physiology |Defining the Mechanism by which Obesity May Protect Against Lung Cancer
Mentors: Katerina Politi, Nikhil Joshi

Sarah Weiss, MD, Assistant Professor (Medical Oncology) | Overcoming resistance to immune checkpoint inhibition by co-targeting the innate and adaptive immune systems in NSCLC
Mentor: Scott Gettinger

Developmental Research Program
Barbara Burtness, MD, Professor of Medicine (Medical Oncology) | Combined AURKA and WEE1 targeting inhibits a druggable effector pathway in KRAS mutant lung carcinoma

Anne Chiang, MD, PhD, Associate Professor of Medicine (Medical Oncology); Chief Network Officer and Deputy Chief Medical Officer, Smilow Cancer Network and Katerina Politi, PhD, Associate Professor of Pathology | Exploring defects in MHC I antigen presentation in SCLC with acquired resistance to immunotherapy

Nikhil Joshi, PhD, Assistant Professor of Immunobiology and Joseph Craft, MD, Paul B. Beeson Professor of Medicine (Rheumatology) and Professor of Immunobiology | Investigating T and B cell responses against lung cancer in genetically-engineered animal models
Carla Rothlin, PhD, Dorys McConnell Duberg Professor of Immunobiology and Professor of Pharmacology and Sourav Ghosh, PhD, Associate Professor of Neurology and Pharmacology | Target validation and proof-of-concept for MERTK inhibition in preclinical models of lung cancer

Jeff Townsend, PhD, Elihu Professor of Biostatistics and Professor of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology and Karen Anderson, PhD, Professor of Pharmacology and of Molecular Biophysics and Biochemistry | Probing the Role of the Supermutator, APOBEC3B, in Lung Cancer

Seven Yale Cancer Center Pilot Awards have been granted to members of six different Research Programs. The awardees are as follows:
Stephanie Halene, MD, PhD, Genomics, Genetics, and Epigenetics | Targeting m6A RNA Modification in MDS/AML
Stavroula Hatzios, PhD, Cancer Microbiology | Elucidating the Role of an Infection-activated Redox Switch in Tumorigenesis
Yansheng Liu, PhD, Cancer Signaling Networks | Phosphoproteomic Profiling of Oncogenic KRAS Mutants in Pancreatic Cancer
Grace Chen, PhD, Cancer Immunology | The Development of Circular RNAs to Treat Melanoma
Shuangge Ma, PhD, Cancer Prevention and Control | Quantifying and Improving Reproducibility in Cancer Omics Studies
Lilian Kabeche, PhD, Radiobiology and Radiotherapy | Role of BRCA1 induced Centromeric R-loops in Chemotherapy Resistance
Faye Rogers, PhD, Radiobiology and Radiotherapy | Therapeutic Targeting of Gene Amplification in High-Grade Serous Ovarian Cancer


Patricia LoRusso, DO, has been appointed to the Association of American Cancer Institutes (AACI) Clinical Research Initiative Steering Committee to serve a three-year term, effective October 1.

Congratulations to Nina Kadan-Lottick, MD, MSPH, on the Children’s Cancer Cause Recognition Award from the Children’s Cancer Cause and the Stewart Family Fund.

September 2020

Mehra Golshan, MD, MBA, has been awarded a 1-year, $175,000 research grant from the Breast Cancer Research Foundation to study reducing re-excisions for breast conserving therapy for women following surgery for breast cancer.

Led by Mandar Muzumdar, MD, the National Institutes of Health has awarded an Exploratory Developmental Grant to fund 3D gene imaging research at Yale Cancer Center.

James Boyer, MD, FACEP, received the International Recognition Award from the European Association for the Study of the Liver during the 2020 Digital International Liver Congress.

The American Medical Association Women Physicians Section (WPS), in conjunction with the AMA Foundation, established the Joan F. Giambalvo Fund for the Advancement of Women and has awarded Anees Chagpar, MD, MSc, MPH, MA, MBA, FACS, with a 2020 Giambalvo Fund Grant.

Meena Moran, MD, has been appointed Vice Chair of the NCCN Breast Cancer Panel.

Carrie Lucas, PhD, has been awarded the Christina Fleischmann Award to Young Women Investigators from the International Cytokine and Interferon Society.

Aaron Ring, MD, PhD, has won the International Cytokine and Interferon Society Milstein Young Investigator Award. Recipients of this award are young investigators who have received their PhD or MD in the last 10 years, and have demonstrated notable contributions to either basic or clinical research.

August 2020

Jeffrey Ishizuka, MD, DPhil, was awarded a Distinguished Young Investigator Award in the Clinical Scientist Category from the Immuno-Oncology Young Investigators' Forum to support his research “Targeting dsRNA Editing Tumors to Overcome Resistance to Immune Checkpoint Blockade.”

John Kunstman, MD, MHS, has received the New England Surgical Society Scholars Foundation Board Scholars Research Grant for his proposal "Development of an Organoid-based Model System for Intraductal Papillary Mucinous Neoplasia of the Pancreas.”

Amy C. Justice, MD, PhD, has been chosen to participate in the COVID-19 Insights Partnership, a joint initiative between the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA), along with the Departments of Energy (DOE) and Health and Human Services (HHS).

Mandar Muzumdar, MD and Siyuan (Steven) Wang, PhD, have been awarded an R33 grant from the NCI for $1.24 million to support their research on multiplexed imaging of chromatin folding and RNA profiles in cancer.

Vish Muthusamy, PhD, Marcus Bosenberg, MD, PhD, and Katerina Politi, PhD, have been awarded an AstraZeneca Sponsored Research Agreement to support their project, "Investigating the anti-tumor activity of mIL-12 mRNA in B2M deficient syngeneic mouse tumor models." The amount of award is $667,874.

CureSearch for Children's Cancer, in partnership with the SebastianStrong Foundation, has awarded a $225,000 Young Investigator Grant to Yale Cancer Center's Dr. Ranjith Menon Muraleedharan, who will develop a new treatment approach for diffuse intrinsic pontine glioma (DIPG).

July 2020

Prasanna Ananth, MD, MPH, has been awarded a St. Baldrick's Scholar Award from the St. Baldrick's Foundation to support her research over the next two years to better define standards of high-quality end-of-life care for children with cancer and develop interventions to provide optimal care for children with incurable cancers.

2020 Blavatnik Award recipients include:
Jeffrey Bender, MD, received continued funding for a project to enhance miRNA target-based oligonucleotide therapy for the treatment of uveitis and other inflammatory disorders.
Ranjit Bindra, MD, PhD, was awarded funding for Athena Therapeutics.
Sidi Chen, PhD, will use his award for MAEGI Medicine, a new paradigm of immune gene therapy.
Barbara Ehrlich, PhD, will use the funding to continue research on the rare Wolfram syndrome.
Peter Glazer, MD, PhD, received funding for his work with antibody-mediated gene delivery and editing.
Ya Ha, PhD, is targeting p53 mutation in human cancer.
Akiko Iwasaki, PhD, has received monetary support for CynAxis, an immunological approach to provide drug access to the central nervous system (CNS).
Mark Lemmon, PhD, FRS, will use his funding to further his research for drugging fibrodysplasia ossificans progressiva (FOP).

Roy S. Herbst, MD, PhD, is hosting the 21st Annual International Lung Cancer Congress live webcast.

Jill Lacy, MD, received the 2020 Rosemarie L. Fisher. MD Award for Excellence in Graduate Medical Education.

Kurt Schalper, MD, PhD, received an R37 Merit Award from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to fund his research in pathways for cancer immunotherapy over the next 7 years.
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The Association of American Cancer Institutes (AACI) has elected Charles Fuchs, MD, MPH, to its Board of Directors.

Lynn D. Wilson, MD, MPH, is the recipient of the Anthony Edward Kupka '64 Distinguished Alumnus Award.

June 2020

Alfred Lee, MD, PhD, has been appointed to the American Society of Hematology (ASH) Guideline Panel on Use of Anticoagulation in Patients With COVID-19.

Roy S. Herbst, MD, PhD, Chief of Medical Oncology, has been elected to the American Association for Cancer Research Board of Directors for a three-year term in recognition of his outstanding contributions to cancer research and treatment.

Anthony J. Koleske, PhD, has been named as the Ensign Professor of Molecular Biophysics and Biochemistry (MB&B) and of Neuroscience.

May 2020

Congratulations to our colleagues presenting at Virtual ASCO. We have 6 oral presentations, 22 publications, 7 discussant sections, and 22 posters to support from Yale Cancer Center!Full List of YCC Participation.

Conquer Cancer, the ASCO Foundation, announced recipients of their research awards including two Yale awardees. Congratulations to Sanjay Aneja, MD, who received a Career Development Award, and Mariya Rozenblit, MD, who received a Young Investigator Award.

Scott J. Miller, PhD, has been elected to the prestigious National Academy of Sciences (NAS) in recognition of his distinguished and continuing achievements in original research.

Caroline Johnson, PhD, has received a four-year, $792,000 Research Scholar Grant from the American Cancer Society (ACS). Dr. Johnson will use the grant to understand metabolic heterogeneity in colorectal cancer.

David C. Madoff, MD, PhD, has been appointed as the Yale Cancer Center/Smilow Cancer Hospital representative to the NCCN Kidney Cancer Panel.

Anne Chiang, MD, PhD, has been named a Fellow of the American Society of Clinical Oncology.

Dr. Susan J. Baserga, was recently appointed as the William H. Fleming, M.D. Professor of Molecular Biophysics and Biochemistry.

The American Academy of Microbiology has elected 73 new Fellows to the Class of 2020, including Yale Cancer Center's Akiko Iwasaki, PhD, and Walther Mothes, PhD.

Conquer Cancer, the ASCO Foundation, has announced its annual Special Merit Awards, including the Pain and Symptom Management Special Merit Award, which has been given to Vikram Jairam, MD.

The Society for Immunotherapy of Cancer announced Dr. Lieping Chen as one of the recipients of the Richard V. Smalley, MD, Memorial Award and Lectureship, the Society's highest honor, for his pioneering research in immunotherapy.

Zhengxin (Jason) Cai, PhD, has been awarded an R03 grant from the National Institutes of Health (NIH).

April 2020

Dmitry Kozhevnikov, DO, Laura J. Morrison, MD, and Matthew S. Ellman, MD, received the Rosenkranz Award for Pedagogical Advancement from the Yale Poorvu Center for Teaching and Learning.
The American Association of Physicists in Medicine has awarded the Michael D. Mills Editor in Chief Award of Excellence for an Outstanding General Medical Physics Article to Jennifer Johnson, Eric Ford, James Yu, Courtney Buckey, Shannon Fogh, and Suzanne B. Evans for their paper, "Peer Support: A needs assessment for social support from trained peers in response to stress among medical physicists."

Carla Rothlin, PhD, has been named a senior editor of eLife, an open access journal.

March 2020

The United States Department of Defense (DoD) has named Sidi Chen, PhD, as a recipient of its Era of Hope Scholar Award.

Yale Cancer Center has awarded two Yale Discovery Fund applications for 2020. Congratulations to this year's awardees:
Ranjit Bindra, MD, PhD, and W. Mark Saltzman, PhD: Beyond the BBB: Exploiting NAD metabolic defects in glioma using CNS-directed nanoparticles
Joseph Contessa, MD, PhD, David Rimm, MD, PhD, and Barbara Burtness, MD: STING: biomarker and therapeutic target in HNSCC

Grace Chen, PhD, has been awarded the prestigious Rita Allen Foundation Scholar Award. The Rita Allen Foundation Scholars program funds basic biomedical research in the fields of cancer, immunology, and neuroscience.

Jeffrey Ishizuka, MD, DPhil, has been awarded a K08 Award from the National Institutes of Health to support his project, Triggering Innate Immunity in Tumor Cells to Overcome Resistance to Immunotherapy.
Rong Fan, PhD, and Jiangbing Zhou, PhD, have been awarded a Cancer Tissue Engineering Collaborative R01 Award to support their project Ex Vivo Analysis of Human Brain Tumor Cells in a Microvascular Niche Model.

Prasanna Ananth, MD, has been selected to receive an American Academy of Hospice and Palliative Medicine Paper Award for her proposal, "What Defines High Quality End-of-Life Care for Children with Cancer? A Stakeholder-Driven Qualitative Study."

February 2020

Yanixa Quinones-Aviles, has been selected as one of only 40 fellows across the United States and Puerto Rico for the Yale Ciencia Academy for Career Development.

The National and Kapodistrian University of Athens conferred a Doctor Honoris Causa (Honorary Doctorate in Medicine) to David Rimm, MD, PhD, Professor of Pathology and and Medicine (Medical Oncology).

Dr. Roy S. Herbst has been selected as a candidate for the American Association for Cancer Research (AACR) Board of Directors.

Brigid Killelea, MD, MPH, FACS, has been appointed Vice Chair of the Training - Breast Programs Subcommittee for the Society of Surgical Oncology.

The National Comprehensive Cancer Network (NCCN) has funded Cary Gross, MD to support a research collaboration with Elena Ratner, MD, and Dena Schulman-Green, PhD, to develop new approaches to identify patients with unmet social needs and connect them with resources in their own communities.

Richard A. Flavell, PhD, Sterling Professor of Immunobiology, a Howard Hughes Medical Institute investigator, and a member of Yale Cancer Center's Cancer Immunology Research Program, has been named a Distinguished Fellow by the American Association of Immunologists (AAI).

Dr. Julius Chapiro was awarded a $100,000 research grant from the Society of Interventional Oncology for his project titled, "Molecular Imaging of the Immuno-Metabolic Crosstalk to Guide Combination Therapies of Liver Cancer."

January 2020

Valentina Greco, PhD, has been awarded one of only two Yale Postdoctoral Mentoring Prizes, as well as the Department of Genetics Mentoring Award. Both prizes celebrate the dedication of a faculty member to the growth of their lab members.

Elias Lolis, PhD, has been appointed the inaugural faculty director of the Office of Postdoctoral Affairs (OPA).

Hongyu Zhao, PhD, was recently presented the Pao-Lu Hsu Prize at the 11th International Chinese Statistical Association conference in Hangzhou, China

December 2019

Ranjit Bindra, MD, PhD and Peter Glazer, MD, PhD were both winners at this year's Pitchfest for "Best Presentation" and "Highest Potential Impact," respectively. Their science was recognized during the annual competition sponsored by Yale's Office for Cooperative Research.

Don Nguyen, PhD has been awarded a renewal to his R01 from the NIH to study mechanisms of lung cancer lineage heterogeneity and metastasis.

Debra Brandt, DO, has been selected as one of 12 oncologists nationwide to participate in the 2020-2021 ASCO Education Scholars Program. The program provides learning science and leadership skills training to enhance ASCO's education offerings.

Caroline Johnson, PhD, received the Metabolomics Association of North America 2019 Young Investigator Award for excellence in metabolomics work by early-career scientists.

The Lion Heart grant committee met last week and reviewed the 2019 grant submissions, selecting to fund the following three projects:
  1. Elucidating the role of the long coding RNA Pvt1 in Cancer: Nadya Dimitrova, PhD
  2. Exploring Complementary Insulin-Lowering Agents as Adjuvants to Chemotherapy: Rachel Perry, PhD
  3. Drug discovery with humanized bacteria identifies kinase muscle type 2 phosphorylation as potential target to treat highly aggressive metastatic breast cancer: Jesse Rinehart, PhD

November 2019

Laura Morrison, MD, has been elected to the Board of Directors for the American Academy of Hospice and Palliative Medicine (AAHPM).

Jennifer Kapo, MD, and Melissa Weimer, DO, recently presented at the Association for Multidisciplinary Education and Research in Substance Use and Addiction (AMERSA) National Meeting in Boston, MA on Survivor Story: Beating Cancer and Tapering Opioids.

Roy S. Herbst, MD, PhD, presented the Waun Ki Hong Memorial Lecture at the AACR-Korean Cancer Association Joint Workshop on Precision Medicine last week on Personalized Therapy for Advanced Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer: From BATTLE to Immunotherapy.

Ena Williams, Hope Serra, and Mary Ellen Kosturko

Congratulations to Hope Serra who was selected as the Ambulatory Care Associate Circle of Care Award recipient for the Yale New Haven Health System. Hope works in the Smilow Surgical Specialty Clinic at the Park Avenue Medical Center and was one of two ACAs awarded this inaugural honor at the Care Associates celebration for the Health System on Monday afternoon.

Monica Fradkin, MPH, BSN, CNML, and Lisa Shomsky, MBA, BSN, CNML, have been promoted to Smilow Regional Directors.

Daniel Boffa, MD, Professor of Surgery (Thoracic Surgery), has been appointed Chair of the Commission on Cancer (CoC) Quality Integration Committee and to the CoC Executive Committee.

Marianne Davies was awarded the 2019 APP Publishing Award, which highlights clinically practicing APP who has made significant advancements by publishing or implementing their research efforts or quality initiatives to the gain of YNHH patients or staff. Vanna Dest was honored with the 2019 Gratitude Award in recognition of her leadership of the APP Week Planning Committee as well as her contributions to the APP field and support of her colleagues.

Jill Lacy, MD, has been appointed to the Dean's Faculty Advisory Council to represent Yale Cancer Center.

Roy S. Herbst, MD, PhD, will give the Waun Ki Hong Memorial Lecture at the AACR-Korean Cancer Association Joint Workshop on Precision Medicine next week on "Personalized Therapy for Advanced Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer: From BATTLE to Immunotherapy."

The following faculty in Medical Oncology and Hematology were promoted this year: Scott Gettinger, MD, Professor; Sarah Goldberg, MD, MPH, Associate Professor; Lucia Jilaveanu, MD, PhD, Associate Professor; Joseph Kim, MD, Associate Professor; Nikolai Podoltsev, MD, PhD, Associate Professor; Tara Sanft, MD, Associate Professor; Stacey Stein, MD, Associate Professor; and Amer Zeidan, MBBS, Associate Professor.

Dr. Nita Ahuja has announced the following promotions of SCH/YCC members in the Department of Surgery: Justin Blasberg, MD, MPH, Associate Professor of Thoracic Surgery; Daniel Boffa, MD, Professor of Thoracic Surgery; Anees Chagpar, MD, MBA, MPH, Professor of Oncology; Sajid Khan, MD, Associate Professor of Oncology; Saral Mehra, MD, MBA, Associate Professor of Otolaryngology.

Dr. Peter Glazer announced the following appointments and promotions in Therapeutic Radiology: Joseph Contessa, MD, PhD, Professor of Therapeutic Radiology in the Traditional Track; James Yu, MD, MHS, Professor of Therapeutic Radiology in the Clinician Educator Track; Brian Wang, PhD, Professor of Therapeutic Radiology in the Clinician Educator Track, and Kimberly Johung, MD, PhD, Associate Professor of Therapeutic Radiology in the Clinician Educator Track.

October 2019

Antonio Omuro, MD, has been named Chair of Yale Cancer Center's Protocol Review Committee II.
Herta Chao, MD, PhD, presented the Department of Internal Medicine's inaugural The Second Century of Women at Yale: Emerging Leaders in Internal Medicine Medical Grand Rounds on "Cognitive Side Effects of Cancer Therapy."

Peter Glazer, MD, PhD, and W. Mark Saltzman, PhD, have received a new grant in collaboration with colleagues at Carnegie Mellon University from the National Institutes of Health's Somatic Cell Genome Editing (SCGE) Program.

Lynn Savic, MD, received a Radiological Society of North America Trainee Research Prize for her work on Novel Molecular Imaging Biomarkers for Immune Response to Liver Cancer Therapy.

Marcus Bosenberg, MD, PhD, and Aaron Ring, MD, PhD, were awarded a $3.8 million grant from the National Cancer Institute to develop a new cytokine-based immunotherapy for melanoma.

Three Yale Cancer Center researchers were awarded grants from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) through its High-Risk, High-Reward Research Program. The awards fund highly innovative and unusually impactful biomedical or behavioral research proposed by extraordinarily creative scientists. Valentina Greco, PhD, received a NIH Director's Pioneer Award to support her project, "Defining the role of the mutational burden in healthy aging." Mandar Deepak Muzumdar, MD, and Noah Palm, PhD, each received an NIH Director's New Innovator Award.

Yale Cancer Center was highlighted by SWOG at their annual meeting last week for being one of 5 SWOG Lead Academic Partner and Member Site top accruers in 2018 to SWOG managed trials.

September 2019

Lajos Pusztai, MD, DPhil, has been awarded a Susan G. Komen Leadership Grant to support his project, "Immunological characterization of primary and metastatic breast cancer and discovery of novel therapeutic targets from genomic analysis of cancers."

Nina Kadan-Lottick, MD, has been awarded a U01 Collaborative Research Grant

Gary Kupfer, MD, was presented with a $300,000 Hyundai Scholar Hope Grant

The prestigious British Medical Association (BMA) Medical Book Awards awarded DeVita, Hellman, and Rosenberg's Cancer: Principles & Practice of Oncology, 11th Edition First Prize Oncology!

August 2019

Jason Cai, PhD, has been awarded an Exploratory/Development R21 grant from the National Institutes of Health (NIH).

Leah Ferrucci, PhD, MPH, has been selected to participate in SWOG's Young Investigator Training Course in Seattle next month.

Carla Vanina Rothlin, PhD, has been named the Dorys McConnell Duberg Professor of Immunobiology.

Jun Deng, PhD, has been awarded a big data research grant from the National Science Foundation/National Institutes of Health. The award is $750,000 over three years, and began on August 1, 2019.
Stand Up To Cancer and the Society for Immunotherapy of Cancer awarded Dr. Yang Liu one of five Convergence Scholar Fellowship Awards.

Amy Caroline Justice, PhD, was recently appointed as the C.N.H. Long Professor of Medicine and of Public Health.

Stephanie Samples O'Malley, PhD, was recently named as the Elizabeth Mears and House Jameson Professor of Psychiatry.

Kevan Herold, MD, is newly appointed as the C.N.H. Long Professor of Immunobiology and of Medicine.

The National Academy of Inventors (NAI) has named Rong Fan, PhD, as one of the Spring 2019 NAI Senior Members.

Frederick Wilson, MD, PhD, has been awarded a 2019 Clinical Scientist Development Award from the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation. Dr. Wilson will use the award of $495,000 over three years to continue his research on targeted therapies for NSCLC and melanoma, and acquired resistance.

Dr. Sanjay Aneja recently presented at the NRG Oncology Digital Health Workshop and at their Translational Science Workshop on "Radiomics."

July 2019

Welcome Joyce Nancarrow Tull, RN, BSW, MSN, CCRP, as Director of our Clinical Trials Office (CTO) and Assistant Director for Clinical Sciences.

Roy S. Herbst, MD, PhD
, has been named to the Board of Directors for the International Association for the Study of Lung Cancer (IASLC). He will assume his four-year term at the upcoming IASLC 2019 World Conference on Lung Cancer in Barcelona in September.

Congratulations to Karen Reyes-Benzi, RN, who was awarded the Yale New Haven Hospital Magnet Nurse of the Year. Karen is a nurse in the infusion suite on NP7 in our Hematology Outpatient clinic and is a 26 year Navy Veteran.

Dr. Gregory Zanieski has joined the Yale School of Medicine Department of Surgery and will care for patients with breast cancer at Lawrence + Memorial Hospital in New London, in collaboration with the Smilow Cancer Hospital Care Center in Waterford.

Ellen F. Foxman, MD, PhD
, was named a 2019 Hartwell Investigator. She will receive support for three years at $100,000 direct cost per year for research funding for a Novel Diagnostic Test to Reduce Antibiotic Overuse.

Ranjit Bindra, MD, PhD, and Patricia LoRusso, DO, have received a grant from the Rising Tide Foundation for $450K to support funding for biomarkers for their phase I clinical trial testing olaparib against IDH1/2-mutant cancers. Dr. LoRusso is the lead PI of the clinical trial, and Dr. Bindra is the co-PI. The clinical trial is directly translating basic science work from the Glazer and Bindra labs to clinical research through our Phase I Clinical Trial Program.

Armand V. Russo, MD, has been appointed an Assistant Professor of Clinical Medicine (Medical Oncology) at Yale Cancer Center and is now caring for patients at the Smilow Cancer Care Center in North Haven.

Peter Tattersall, PhD
, has received a two year R21 grant from the National Cancer Institute for $400k in funding to pursue studies on Armed Oncolytic Parvoviral Vectors for Modulating the Tumor Microenvironment.

Roy S. Herbst, MD, PhD and Lieping Chen, MD, PhD, participated in the 2019 China Cancer Immunotherapy Workshop on behalf of Yale Cancer Center.

June 2019

The radiation oncology team, under the leadership of Dr. Christin Knowlton, received full accreditation from the American Society for Radiation Oncology (ASTRO) Accreditation Program for Excellence (APEx®) for four years. We are the first in the New England Region to be awarded the accreditation, which covers Smilow Cancer Hospital and our sites in Hamden, Guilford, Trumbull, and Waterford. This ensures that patients who choose Smilow Cancer Hospital for radiation oncology receive care delivered with the highest safety and quality standards in the industry.

At the ASCO Annual meeting, Deborah Blythe Doroshow, MD, PhD, was awarded the Journal of Clinical Oncology Young Investigator Award from the Conquer Cancer Foundation to support her work, "Targeting DNA Damage Repair Mechanisms in IDH1/2 Mutated Intrahepatic Cholangiocarcinomas and Other Solid Tumors."

Congratulations to Craig M. Crews, PhD, who was recently appointed as the John C. Malone Professor of Molecular, Cellular, and Developmental Biology.

Xiaolei Su, PhD, received a Child Health Research Grant from the Charles Hood Foundation to support his research into the Mechanism of Chimeric Antigen Receptor (CAR) Signaling.

Lynn Tanoue, MD, Professor of Medicine (Pulmonary), has been named Chair of the Assembly of Thoracic Oncology.

Noah Palm, PhD, has been named a 2019 Pew Scholar in the Biomedical Sciences. He will receive four years of funding to continue his research on decoding the diverse impacts of the microbiota on human health and disease.

Roy S. Herbst, MD, PhD, and Suchitra Krishnan-Sarin, PhD, participated in a briefing on Capitol Hill last week hosted by AACR to highlight the impact of e-cigarettes and nicotine on youth and young adults.

Sarah Eder Infantino, MS, RN, OCN, APSM has been promoted to Patient Services Manager of NP14. In her new role, Sarah will provide overall clinical leadership focused on enhancing positive patient/family experiences and collaborate with our physicians and multidisciplinary team to promote service excellence and quality outcomes for NP14.

At the Medical Oncology and Hematology Fellows' graduation, the David Fischer Teaching Awards were presented to Sarah Mougalian, MD for medical oncology and to Alfred Lee, MD, PhD for hematology.

Congratulations to Yale Cancer Center's COPPER team and Smilow Cancer Hospital for their selection as the Yale Medicine Delivery Network Winner at the 2019 Safety, Quality and Experience Conference hosted by Yale Medicine and Yale New Haven Health. Their abstract, Evaluating the Impact of the Oncology Extended Care Clinic on Emergency Department Visit Rates, authored by Tannaz Sedghi and colleagues, was selected for the honor.

May 2019

Roy Decker, MD, PhD has been named Chair of the Radiation Oncology Committee for SWOG.

Yuval Kluger, PhD, has received a Research Project Grant from the NIH to support his project, "Efficient Methods for Calibration, Clustering, Visualization and Imputation of Large scRNA-Seq Data."

The Cancer Immunology Research Program is proud to welcome Zenggang Pan, MD, PhD, to its program. Dr. Pan is an Associate Professor in the Department of Pathology.

Tianxiang Zhang, PhD joins the Cancer Immunology Research Program. Dr. Zhang is an Associate Research Scientist in the Department of Immunobiology.

Nikhil Joshi, PhD, was awarded the Distinguished Young Investigator Research Award at the 5th Annual Immuno-Oncology Young Investigator's Forum for his abstract, "Engineering NINJA for Studies of Cancer Immunology."

April 2019

Lieping Chen, MD, PhD, gave the Society of Surgical Oncology's 2019 James Ewing Lecture on 'Immunological Principles of Anti-PD-1/PD-L1 Cancer Therapy' on Thursday, March 28. The James Ewing Lecture is the highest award of the Society, given to a physician whose work has had a major impact on surgical oncology.

Mandar Muzumdar, MD, a received the Cancer Research Early Career Award from AACR at the annual meeting last week, recognizing outstanding early career investigators who have authored peer-reviewed, original articles published in Cancer Research that have made a significant impact in one or more of the fields represented by the Journal. Dr. Muzumdar was honored for his publication, Adaptive and Reversible Resistance to Kras Inhibition in Pancreatic Cancer Cells, published in Cancer Research in 2018.

Dena Schulman-Green, PhD, is the recipient of the 2019 Suzanne Feetham Nurse Scientist Family Research Award from the Eastern Nursing Research Society.

Bluma (Bibi) Lesch, MD, PhD, has been named a 2019 Searle Scholar, an honor awarded to support the independent research of exceptional young faculty. Yale Cancer Center's Genetics, Genomics and Epigenetics Research Program is proud to welcome Jian Cao, PhD, to its program. Dr. Cao is an Associate Research Scientist in the Department of Pathology.

Alla Vash-Margita, MD, has been appointed to the Cancer Prevention and Control Research Program. Dr. Vash-Margita is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Obstetrics, Gynecology & Reproductive Sciences.

Jennifer M. Kapo, MD, Chief of Palliative Medicine at Smilow Cancer Hospital, has been named the Sherwin B. Nuland and Michael K. Vlock Associate Professor of Palliative Medicine.

The American Institute for Medical and Biological Engineering (AIMBE) has announced the induction of Rong Fan, PhD, a member of Yale Cancer Center's Signal Transduction Research Program, to its College of Fellows.

The International Cytokine & Interferon Society (ICIS) announced that the Seymour and Vivian Milstein Award has been bestowed on two world leaders in deciphering the fundamental mechanisms of innate immunity in directing cytokine driven responses. Akiko Iwasaki, PhD, and Hao Wu, PhD, will share the 2019 award. Dr. Iwasaki is the Waldemar Von Zedtwitz Professor of Immunobiology; Molecular, Cellular and Developmental Biology; and Dermatology, and a member of Yale Cancer Center's Virus and Other Infection-associated Cancers Research Program.

Don Nguyen, PhD and Katerina Politi, PhD, have received a 5-year, $3,905,393 NCI grant to support, "Uncovering the Biology of Resistance to Tyrosine Kinase Inhibitors in EGFR Mutant Lung Cancer Patient Derived Models."

Sanjay Aneja, MD, was co-chair of an NCI-ASTRO workshop on Artificial Intelligence in Radiation Oncology earlier this month. He presented on, "The Impact of Artificial Intelligence on the Clinical Radiation Oncologist."

Dr. Laura Morrison and Dr. Scott Sussman, physicians in the Smilow Cancer Hospital Palliative Care Program, were welcomed as new Fellows of the American College of Physicians earlier this month.

Yale Cancer Center's Cancer Prevention and Control Research Program is proud to welcome Ania Jastreboff, MD, PhD, to its program. Dr. Jastreboff is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Internal Medicine and Pediatrics.

Navid Hafez, MD, MPH, recently joined the Developmental Therapeutics Research Program. Dr. Hafez is an Assistant Professor of Medicine (Medical Oncology).

Our Nursing team had a great presence at the 44th annual Oncology Nursing Society Congress earlier this month. All of the abstracts submitted by the Smilow nursing team were accepted, for a total of 7 posters and 4 podium presentations.

March 2019

Marcella Nunez-Smith, MD, MHS, has been selected for Team Science Award by the Association for Clinical and Translational Science on behalf of the Eastern Caribbean Health Outcomes Research Network.

The Signal Transduction Research Program is proud to welcome Jesse Rinehart, PhD to its program. Dr. Rinehart is an Associate Professor in the Department of Cellular and Molecular Physiology.

Michael Cecchini, MD, has joined the Developmental Therapeutics Research Program. Dr. Cecchini is an Assistant Professor of Medicine (Medical Oncology).

Michael Leapman, MD, has been awarded a K08 Clinical Investigator Award from the NIH to support his project, Understanding the Adoption and Impact of New Risk Assessment Technologies in Prostate Cancer Care.

Congratulations to Patricia LoRusso, DO, Professor of Medicine (Medical Oncology) and Associate Director for Experimental Therapeutics, on her candidacy for the Nominating Committee for AACR.

The North American Vascular Biology Organization (NAVBO) will give its Earl P. Benditt Award to William Sessa, PhD, Alfred Gilman Professor of Pharmacology, Professor of Medicine (Cardiology), and a member of Yale Cancer Center's Developmental Therapeutics Research Program.

The Department of Radiology and Biomedical Imaging received special recognition from the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services for Excellence in Person and Family Engagement with appreciation for exemplary practices to transform clinical practice and improve health outcomes.

The Developmental Therapeutics Research Program is proud to welcome Antonio Omuro, MD. Dr. Omuro is Chief of Neuro-Oncology at Yale Cancer Center and leader of the Brain Tumor Disease Aligned Research Team (DART).

Dhanpat Jain, MD has been appointed to the Genetics, Genomics and Epigentics Research Program. Dr. Jain is a Professor in the Department of Pathology.

February 2019

Susan Baserga, MD, PhD, has been awarded a 2019 Breast Cancer Alliance Exceptional Project Grant to support her research project, "Targeting the Nucleolus for Breast Cancer Therapy."

Qin Yan, PhD, has been awarded the Norma Lies Mitchell Memorial Grant from the Breast Cancer Alliance to support his research project, "Targeting KDM5B Histone Demethylase to Boost Anti-tumor Response in Breast Cancer."

Congratulations to Dr. Lynn Tanoue on the recent recognition of her clinical excellence, devotion, and dedication to patient care by the Connecticut Thoracic Society.

Katerina Politi, PhD, received funding of a Research Project Grant (R01) from the NIH, "Understanding and Overcoming Resistance to Cancer Immunotherapy Due to Defective Antigen Presentation" for $3,436,514 over 5 years. Co-investigators include Peter Cresswell, Paula Kavathas, Rong Fan, Kurt Schalper, as well as Roy Herbst, Scott Gettinger, Marcus Bosenberg, Aaron Ring, and Nik Joshi at Yale and Lewis Lanier at UCSF.

Nadine Housri, MD, and Sanjay Aneja, MD, were awarded a National Science Foundation grant to use theMednet to build machine learning technology to raise physician awareness of clinical trials.

The Connecticut Academy of Science and Engineering has elected 24 new members, four are Yale Cancer Center members: Shuangge Steven Ma, PhD, Harvey Risch, MD, PhD, David G. Schatz, PhD, and Jeffrey P. Townsend, PhD

January 2019

Richard Kibbey, MD, PhD, will be inducted into the American Society for Clinical Investigation in April.

Congratulations to Maribel Robinson, ACA, from the Breast Center at the Park Avenue Medical Center in Trumbull! Maribel received the Yale New Haven Health System Nurses' Choice Award

The Genetics, Genomics, and Epigenetics Research Program is proud to welcome Gloria Huang, MD.

The Cancer Immunology Research Program welcomes Ye Grace Chen, PhD.

Craig Crews, PhD, has been awarded the 2019 Pharmacia-ASPET Award for Experimental Therapeutics from the American Society for Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics (ASPET).

Dr. Michael DiGiovanna, was co-author of the KATHERINE Trial presented at the San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium last month and published in the New England Journal of Medicine.

Vincent T. DeVita, Jr., MD, has published the 11th edition of Cancer: Principles and Practices of Oncology.

December 2018

Francine Foss, MD, presented the results of the Phase One Trial of Cobomarsen, an Inhibitor of Mir-155, in Cutaneous T Cell Lymphoma at the ASH Annual Meeting.

Susan Baserga, PhD, has been elected as a fellow of the National Academy of Inventors (NAI).

Anton Bennett, PhD, has been named the Dorys McConnell Duberg Professor of Pharmacology.

The Blavatnik Fund for Innovation at Yale, announced its 2018 grant awardees. Congratulations to Jeffrey Bender, MD, Akiko Iwasaki, PhD, Anna Pyle, PhD, Aaron Ring, MD, PhD

Congratulations to the three recipients of the 2019 Lion Heart Grants to support Breast Cancer Research: Vignesh Gunasekharan, PhD, James Hansen, MD, MS, and Tristen Park, MD.

November 2018

Debra Brandt, DO, has been elected to represent the medical oncology faculty on the Yale School of Medicine's Dean's Faculty Advisory Council for a two-year term.

Hari Deshpande, MD, and Patricia LoRusso, DO, were recognized by Sarcoma Central in their first annual "science spotlight" competition. The Connective Tissue Oncology Society (CTOS) announced the results at their annual meeting earlier this month.

Dr. Jennifer Kapo, and Dr. Wajih Zaheer Kidwai, recently presented at the Palliative and Supportive Care in Oncology Symposium in San Diego.

Craig Crews, PhD, has been awarded one of two prestigious, five-year, renewable American Cancer Society Research Professorships.

Tara Sanft, MD, participated in the AtlanticLIVE Cancer Summit earlier this week to discuss cancer survivorship and concerns of cancer survivors with the attendees.

Dr. Barbara Burtness presented the results from the KEYNOTE- 048 study at ESMO in Munich last week.

The Breast Cancer Research Foundation has funded three Yale Cancer Center members with grants to support their research to advance breast cancer prevention and treatment. Dr. David Rimm's research will focus on developing an assay to match the right drug for HER2-positive breast cancer to the right patient. Dr. Melinda Irwin is conducting a clinical study to examine the effect of diet and exercise on biomarkers, body composition, and quality of life for women with breast cancer, and, Dr. Lajos Pusztai is seeking strategies to improve response to immunotherapy in triple negative breast cancer.

Dr. Daniel Boffa has been named Vice Chair of the Quality Integration Committee for the Commission on Cancer.

The Connecticut Nurses' Association recently recognized the contribution Yale New Haven Hospital Adult Sickle Cell Program has made to integrate evidence based practice, lifelong learning, and patient centered quality outcomes into their practice.

October 2018

Catherine Lyons, MSN, RN, was recently presented with the 2018 Doris M. Armstrong Award for Outstanding Contribution to Nursing Administration by the Connecticut Nurses Association (CNA).

David Hafler, MD, has been elected to the National Academy of Medicine, in recognition of his outstanding achievements in medicine.

Melinda Irwin, PhD, MPH, Yawei Zhang, MD, PhD, MPH, and Vasilis Vasilou, PhD, presented at the Commemorative Conference of the 60th Anniversary of the National Cancer Hospital and the academic conference of the National Cancer Center in Beijing.

Diane Krause, MD, PhD, has received the 2018 Yale Postdoctoral Mentoring Prize, awarded annually by the Office of the Provost to a faculty member who exemplifies the role of a mentor and who has provided exceptional mentoring to one or more postdoctoral scholars during the previous year.

Claudio Alarcon, PhD, has been awarded a 2018 V Scholar Program Grant to fund his project, "Epitranscriptomic Regulation of Cancer Metastasis."

Sidi Chen, PhD, has been awarded a $2.5 million 'High Risk, High Rewards' grant from the Common Fund of the National Institutes of Health to fund a five-year research project to improve T cell-based immunotherapy to fight diseases such as cancer.

Tae Kon Kim, MD, PhD, has received a clinician scientist grant from the American Cancer Society to support his research for the next 5 years.

September 2018

Joan Steitz, PhD, is the recipient of the 2018 Lasker~Koshland Special Achievement Award in Medical Science

Karla Neugebauer, PhD, has been appointed the new Director of the Yale Center for RNA Science and Medicine

The Cancer Immunology Research Program is proud to welcome Juan Vasquez, MD, MHS

The Yale SPORE in Lung Cancer recently awarded their Career Enhancement and Developmental Research Awards. The following investigators were awarded funding to support their projects: Brett Bade, PhD, Asha Jayakumar, PhD, Mandar Muzumdar, MD, Lauren Baldassarre, MD, Brinda Emu, MD, Aaron Ring, MD, PhD, David Calderwood, PhD, and Andrew Xiao, PhD
The Connecticut Brain Tumor Alliance will honor Joseph Piepmeier, MD with their Lifetime Achievement award during their annual Path of Hope event on Saturday, September 29. Jennifer Moliterno, MD will serve as Honorary Chair of the event.

August 2018

Harvey Risch, MD, PhD, is the recipient of the 2018 Ruth Leff Siegel Award for Excellence in Pancreatic Cancer Research. Dr. Risch's research has earned international attention for showing the association between colonization by Helicobacter pylori and the risk of pancreatic cancer and demonstrating that regular aspirin usage cuts the risk of pancreatic cancer by about one-third.
Katerina Politi, PhD, has been named the Co-Chair of SWOG's new Immunotherapy Committee.
Sangini Sheth, MD, MPH, has received a K07 Award from the National Cancer Institute to support her project, Implementation of Inpatient Postpartum Human Papillomavirus Immunization. Dr. Sheth will study the integration of a targeted immunization strategy, inpatient postpartum HPV (IPP-HPV) immunization, into routine care by developing an electronic medical record-based tool.
Peggy Myung, MD, PhD, is one of 18 scientists selected by the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation to receive a Clinical Scientist Development Award. Dr. Myung's project is titled "Dissecting the epithelial-mesenchymal interactions at the interface of the human skin regeneration and cancer."

July 2018

Dr. Amer Zeidan has received a 2018 Cancer Clinical Investigator Team Leadership Award from the National Cancer Institute. The award supports outstanding clinical researchers at NCI-Designated Cancer Centers and recognizes outstanding mid-career clinical investigators.

CureSearch has awarded its inaugural Catapult Award to Dr. Ranjit Bindra to support his ground-breaking work on a novel drug for pediatric glioma through the launch of a new clinical trial.

Katherine Harvey, MD, MPH, has been selected as the American Medical Association Delegate from Connecticut to the Physician House of Delegates. She also serves as the young physician representative at the CT State Medical Society.

Dr. Shilpa Hattangadi is the recipient of a $100,000 Hyundai Impact Award. Dr. Hattangadi is one of 21 recipients of this year's award, which is given to a researcher in pediatric oncology departments at select children's hospitals nationwide.

Roy S. Herbst, MD, PhD, moderated the American Association for Cancer Research (AACR) Congressional Briefing on E-Cigarettes, along with Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Illinois) and Rep. Jackie Speier (D-California), who served as honorary congressional co-chairs. Dr. Herbst is also Chair of the AACR Tobacco and Cancer Subcommittee.

Ranjit Bindra, MD, PhD, and Brian Shuch, MD, have been awarded an Impact Award from the SWOG/Hope Foundation to support their project, Identification and characterization of oncometabolite-induced DNA repair defects in sporadic papillary kidney cancer.

Congratulations to the 2018 graduating Hospice and Palliative Medicine Fellows! Cassie Glazer, MD, Dmitry Kozhevnikov, DO,Michael Gabriel, MD, and Laura Morrison, MD, Program Director

Angela Khairallah, LCSW, received the Social Work Award of Excellence from Yale New Haven Hospital in recognition of the excellent care and support she provides to patients and their families in the Breast Center.

June 2018

Tae Kon Kim, MD, PhD, received an ASCO Conquer Cancer Foundation Career Development Award to study Overcoming Immune Resistance to PD1 Therapy in High Risk Myelodysplastic Syndrome with Modulating Myeloid Derived Suppressor Cells using an HDAC Inhibitor, Entinostat.

Aaron M. Ring, MD, PhD, joins four other scientists in the 2018 class of Pew-Stewart Scholars for Cancer Research.

Yimeng Gao, PhD, has been awarded a James Hudson Brown-Alexander B. Coxe Fellowship.

Stephanie Halene, MD, PhD, has been awarded a Department of Defense Peer Reviewed Cancer Research Program Award to study Fanconi Anemia in collaboration with Drs. Gary Kupfer and Grzegorz Nalepa at Indiana University.

Oligo Nation and Operation Oligo have awarded Ranjit Bindra, MD, PhD, a research grant in the amount of $125,000 to support his project entitled, "Targeting IDHI Mutant Oligodendroglioma with CNS-Permeable PARP Inhibitor."

Roy S. Herbst, MD, PhD, Chief of Medical Oncology, gave the opening lecture at the World Congress on Interventional Oncology meeting in Boston last weekend on the importance of precision medicine in oncology.

Lieping Chen, MD, PhD, was honored by OncLive as one of 21 Giants of Cancer Care for his research and discoveries in Immuno-Oncology.

Akiko Iwasaki, PhD, received the Charles W. Bohmfalk Prize for teaching in the basic sciences at Yale School of Medicine's graduation ceremonies.

Roy S. Herbst, MD, PhD, has been selected to represent SWOG on the National Cancer Institute's Thoracic Malignancy Steering Committee.

May 2018

Yale Cancer Center, along with Dr. Vincent DeVita, Jr., Dr. Patricia LoRusso, Dr. Joan Steitz, and Dr. Lieping Chen, were honored at a dinner in Hartford last week by the World Affairs Council of Connecticut as their 2018 Luminary Award recipient in recognition of global leadership in cancer research and innovation. YCC: Pioneering the Future of Global Health >>

Craig Crews, PhD, is a recipient of the Khorana Prize, from the Royal Society of Chemistry. The Khorana Prize recognizes outstanding achievement award for research at the chemistry and life science interface.
Dr. Hari Deshpande has been named a co-chair of the Via Oncology Pathways Sarcoma Medical Oncology Committee.

Akiko Iwasaki, PhD, Haifan Lin, PhD, and David G. Schatz, PhD, have been elected to the National Academy of Sciences (NAS), for their outstanding research achievements.

Susan Baserga, MD, PhD, was one of 50 women honored at the 14th annual Connecticut Technology Council Women of Innovation® Awards dinner.

April 2018

Dr. Alfred Lee is the recipient of the 2018 Inspiring Yale Award for the Yale School of Medicine. Dr. Lee was honored during an event with Dr. Francis Collins on April 11 for his inspiration to Yale medical students, and for his commitment to mentoring.

A team of Yale Cancer Center investigators led by Roy Herbst, MD, PhD, has been awarded the 2018 Team Science Award from the Association for Clinical and Translational Science (ACTS) for its pioneering work in advancing our understanding of Immunotherapy.

The American Health Council recently selected Denise Bell, BA, ADN, BSN, MPH to its Board of Nurses for her outstanding contributions to the nursing field. Denise is an infusion nurse at Smilow Cancer Hospital.

Harvey Risch, MD, PhD, will be highlighted by the AACR for his 2016 publication, Aspirin Use and Reduced Risk of Pancreatic Cancer, in AACR's Best of the AACR Journals Collection.

Tae Kon Kim, MD, PhD, has been awarded the EvansMDS Young Investigator Award from the Edward P. Evans Foundation.

The Smilow Palliative Care team recently presented abstracts at the 2018 Annual Assembly of the American Academy of Hospice and Palliative Medicine and the Hospice and Palliative Nurses Association

March 2018

Nicole Deziel, PhD, received an honorable mention in the poster competition at the American Society for Preventive Oncology meeting with co-authors Huangdi Yi, Heather M. Stapleton, Huang Huang, Nan Zhao, and Yawei Zhang.

Hiba Ahmad and Serena Chew's projects were selected as two of the Top 10 Trainee Research Posters for the 2018 Hematology Oncology Pharmacy Association (HOPA) Annual Conference.

Cary Gross, MD, has been elected to the American Society for Clinical Investigation (ASCI). One of the nation's oldest and most prestigious medical honor societies, ASCI supports the work of top physician-scientists whose research improves human health.

The Connecticut Academy of Science and Engineering has elected 24 of the state's leading experts in science, engineering, and technology to membership in the academy, with 3 new members from Yale Cancer Center. Anthony J. Koleske; Gary M. Kupfer; and Sten H. Vermund

February 2018

Rong Fan, PhD and Alessandro Santin, MD were recently awarded grants from the Convergence Research Program, a new program from Stand Up To Cancer which will use artificial intelligence to investigate immunotherapies.

Andrea Silber, MD was awarded a one-year Breast Cancer Alliance Education and Outreach Grant to support "Comprehensive breast cancer education and outreach support for underserved women" through her OWN-IT Program.

Smilow Cancer Hospital recently received $500,000 from a family foundation to support Stephanie Halene, MD, PhD in the study of clonal hematopoiesis, which may offer new opportunities to prevent blood cancers.

Daniel Boffa, MD was appointed to the Quality Integration Committee of the Commission on Cancer.

Jason Crawford, PhD was named the Maxine F. Singer '57 PhD Associate Professor of Chemistry and of Microbial Pathogenesis.

January 2018

Congratulations to the Lion Heart grant recipients: Ranjit Bindra, MD, PhD: Exploiting HR Defects in Breast Cancer with DNA-PK Inhibitor- Based Therapies; Leah Ferrucci, PhD, MPH: Nutritional Status as Assessed by Skin Carotenoids and Chemotherapy Related Side Effects; and Bernadette Marquez-Nostra, PhD: Imaging and Targeted Therapy of EGFR-cMET in Triple Negative Breast Cancer.

Erin Hofstatter, MD was elected as the Faculty Advisory Council representative at Yale School of Medicine for a two-year term for the sections of medical oncology, hematology, and neuro-oncology.

Amer Zeidan, MBBS was selected as lead developer and speaker for the myelodysplastic syndromes (MDS) section in the official Highlights of ASH meetings in San Francisco, Miami, and NYC.

Peggy Myung, PhD, MD was awarded a grant from the American Cancer Society for her research project, Using Live Imaging to Reveal Novel Mechanisms to Suppress Skin Cancer.

Akiki Iwasaki, PhD was named 2018 recipient of AAI-Thermo Fisher Meritorious Career Award by The American Association of Immunologists.

Tara Sanft, MD was awarded more than $2M to support a five-year project with the National Cancer Institute.

Michael Girardi, MD will be presenting at the EMBO Workshop - Perspectives on Skin Cancer in Switzerland.

The YNHHS Peace Award was awarded to the entire team on NP12 in recognition of the extra care they put in to make sure one of our patients could join his son's wedding festivities from the hospital.

The Bindra and Saltzman Laboratories were awarded a grant from an anonymous donor to help support development of a new approach to treatment of gliomas.

December 2017

Cai Roberts, PhD and James Brewer, PhD were each awarded with a Postdoctoral Fellowship Pay-If grant at Yale, which was funded by the American Cancer Society after they were awarded a three-year grant from the Community Foundation for Greater New Haven's Edith P. Rausch Fund.

Roy Herbst, MD, PhD was named to the Wall of Fame at his alma mater, New Rochelle High School, in New Rochelle, New York.

Valentina Greco, PhD received The Class of '61 Research Award, which recognizes recognizes significant accomplishments in cancer research at Yale University by a young member of the faculty, coupled with the expectation for future outstanding contributions to our understanding of the causes and cures for cancer.

Xavier Llor, MD was elected to a two-year term for the Steering Committee of the National Colorectal Cancer Roundtable (NCCRT).

November 2017

Melinda Irwin, PhD, MPH was appointed Vice Chair of the SWOG Survivorship Committee.

Terri Parker, MD has been selected to participate in the American Society of Hematology (ASH) Ambassador Program, which helps support the recruitment and retention of the next generation of hematologists.

Nikhil Joshi, PhD received a scientific research grant from the Lung Cancer Research Foundation to support his work in lung adenocarcinoma models.

Vanna Dest, MSN, APRN received the Schwartz Center Compassionate Caregiver Award.

Donna Viner, RN is the recipient of the Virginia Henderson Award at YNHHS, which is awarded to a direct-care nurse or interdisciplinary patient care team led by a direct-care nurse.

Ranjit Bindra, PhD was awarded three grants to support his research efforts: a R21 with Mark Salztman, PhD; an Innovation Award also with Mark Salztman, PhD; and a Translational Research Program Grant with Stephanie Halene, MD, PhD.


October 2017

Lieping Chen, PhD has been presented with the 2017 Warren Alpert Foundation Prize for transformative discoveries in the field of cancer immunology.

Lajos Pusztai, MD, DPhil was confirmed as Chair of the SWOG Breast Committee.

Roy Herbst, MD, PhD was confirmed as Vice Chair of the SWOG Lung Committee.

Amy Davidoff, PhD was awarded a grant from the Lung Cancer Research Foundation in support of her work in palliative care, as well as a grant from the National Cancer Institute to support her work in older adults with cancer.

Sanjay Aneja, MD received a Resident Clinical/Basic Science Research Abstract Award, which recognizes the top research by a medical resident, from the American Society for Radiation Oncology.

Christopher Corso, MD, PhD received a Basic/Translational Science Award, which recognizes lead authors of top-rated basic and translational abstracts, from the American Society for Radiation Oncology.

September 2017


The National Cancer Institute has named Peter M. Glazer, MD, PhD, as recipient of its Outstanding Investigator Award (OIA).

Andre Levchenko, PhD, was elected as a Fellow of the Biomedical Engineering Society.

Lajos Pusztai, MD, DPhil, has received an R01 from the National Cancer Institute.

August 2017

Joseph Contessa, MD, is the recipient of the Class of '61 Cancer Research Award.

Juan Vasquez, MD, has been awarded a fellows grant from the St. Baldrick's Foundation to support his research on childhood cancers.

Hyun S. "Kevin" Kim, MD, has been awarded a Department of Defense Peer Reviewed Cancer Research Program Award to study Improving Immunotherapy: Boosting Immune Response And Functional Immune Cell Imaging.

2017-2018 Lung SPORE Career Development Program Awardees:

Nadya Dimitrova - Mentor: Katerina Politi
Making first strides towards elucidating the importance of long noncoding RNAs in lung cancer

Joelle Hillion - Mentor: Richard Kibbey
The role of the pentose phosphate pathway in resistance to lung cancer therapy

Nikhil Joshi - Mentor: Lieping Chen
Investigating mechanisms of anti-tumor T cell function in autochithonous models of lung adenocarcinoma

Yu Zhang - Mentor: Lieping Chen
TCR sequences pre and post IO therapy

Joseph Contessa
Synthesis of novel OST inhibitors for the treatment of NSCLC

Richard A. Flavell
Cas9 screen for identification of novel lung cancer co-therapies

J. Peter Koo
Development of novel treatments for immunotherapy refractory lung cancer

July 2017

Edward Snyder, MD, will receive the President's Award from the American Association of Blood Banks at this year's annual meeting in San Diego in October.

Dr. Roy Herbst has been named Vice Chair of the SWOG Lung Committee.

Manoj Pillai, MD, has received an R01 grant from the NIH to support his project "Deregulation of SF3B1 function by recurrent HEAT domain mutations."

Herta Chao, MD, PhD, received a Medicine Service Line Award from the VA New England Healthcare System in recognition of her successful leadership of the Oncology Clinical Trials Program at the VA Connecticut.

Philip W. Askenase, MD, has been awarded the 2018 Distinguished Scientist Award by the American Academy of Allergy, Asthma and Immunology (AAAAI).

Dr. Lisa Fucito received the Distinguished Faculty Supervisor Award from the Department of Psychiatry, section of psychology, during their annual commencement ceremony.

June 2017

Lieping Chen, MD, PhD has been named one of the 2017 recipients of the prestigious Warren Alpert Foundation Prize.

Suzanne Evans, MD, MPH has been named an Executive Editor for Practical Radiation Oncology (PRO).

Ranjit Bindra, MD, PhD has been awarded a Yale Cancer Center Co-Pilot Award to study Exploitation of 2-HG conferred vulnerabilities in IDH1/2 mutant MDS/AML in pre-clinical PDX models, along with Stephanie Halene, MD, PhD.

Maximilian Stahl, MD has earned a Hematology Opportunities for the Next-Generation of Research Scientists (HONORS) award from the American Society of Hematology (ASH).

Maggie Zampano, RN, OCN, MSCN,
was awarded the Joel Silidker Award by the Department of Obstetrics, Gynecology & Reproductive Sciences.

Nadya Dimitrova, PhD has been named a Pew-Stewart Scholar for Cancer Research.

Patrys Limited has licensed from Yale University the worldwide rights to develop the novel lupus anti-DNA antibody 3E10 as a tumor-targeting agent.

OncLive presented its annual Giants of Oncology award to Dr. Daniel Petrylak and Dr. Charles Fuchs

Lajos Pusztai, MD, has been appointed Chairman of the SWOG Breast Committee.

Connecticut Magazine's 2017 "Top Docs" list includes 28 Smilow Cancer Hospital physicians:
Daniel Boffa, Jean Bolognia, Frank Detterbeck, Richard Edelson, Neal Fischbach, Harris Foster, Scott Gettinger, David Hesse, Elizabeth Holt, Silvio Inzucchi, Gary Israel, Anamika Katoch, Martin Katz, Jeremy Kortmansky, Jill Lacy, Johanna LaSala, Alfred Lee, David Leffell, Walter Longo, Thomas Martin, John Persing, Joseph Piepmeier, Vikram Reddy, Kert Sabbath, Ronald Salem, Lynn Tanoue, Robert Weiss and David Witt

The Conquer Cancer Foundation will award two fellows with Young Investigator Awards (YIA). Dr. Michael Cecchini will receive the Pfizer YIA and Dr. Brian Henick will receive the AbbVie, Inc YIA. Dr. Jill Lacy mentors Dr. Cecchini and Dr. Roy Herbst mentors. Dr. Henick.

May 2017

Yale Cancer Center members won research grants from the Blavatnik Fund for Innovation:
Awards of $300,000 from the Blavatnik Fund for Innovation at Yale went to Anton Bennett, PhD.

Pilot grant awards in the amount of $100,000 went to W. Mark Saltzman, PhD, Michael Girardi, MD, and Anna Marie Pyle, PhD.

The National Pancreas Foundation has accredited the Gastrointestinal Cancers Program at Smilow Cancer Hospital as a Center for Excellence in Pancreatic Cancer. Dr. James Farrell led the application process for Smilow Cancer Hospital.

Melinda Irwin, PhD, and Tara Sanft, MD, have received an R-01 to support their project, "A randomized trial of lifestyle guidelines on breast cancer biomarkers and treatment adherence."

The American Society for Investigative Pathology has selected Katerina Politi, PhD, as the recipient of the 2017 Cotran Early Investigator Award.

Congratulations to Tamara Carroll, MD, on her award for her presentation, "Impact of Digital Breast Tomosynthesis" from the Society of Breast Imaging.

April 2017

SU2C Names Dr. Charles Fuchs, Co-Leader of Dream Team on Colorectal Cancer

Catherine Lyons, RN, MS, NEA-BC had been promoted to Vice President for Patient Services at Smilow Cancer Hospital.

Dr. Angelique Levi and Darryl T. Martin, PhD were awarded a pilot grant for their research project, "MRI-Targeted Prostate Cancer Nanomarker" by the Department of Urology during their annual research symposium.

March 2017

Oscar Colegio, MD, PhD, has been chosen as a 2017 recipient of the Young Investigator in Dermatology Award by the American Academy of Dermatology.

Ronald Breaker, PhD, has been named the Sterling Professor of Molecular, Cellular, and Developmental Biology.

Alana Schepartz, PhD, has been appointed the Sterling Professor of Chemistry at Yale University.



February 2017

Jeff Geschwind, MD, Chair of the Department of Radiology and Biomedical Imaging, has been appointed the inaugural President of the Society of Interventional Oncology.

Research led by Roy S. Herbst, MD, PhD was selected by the American Society of Clinical Oncology for inclusion in Clinical Cancer Advances 2017, the Society's annual review of progress against cancer and emerging trends in the field.

Laura J. Morrison, MD, FAAHPM, has been selected by the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education to participate in the Interpersonal and Communication Skills Working Group for the next version of resident and fellow trainee Reporting Milestones.

Preston Sprenkle, MD, received a three-year appointment as Cancer Liaison Physician for the cancer program at VA Connecticut Healthcare System.

January 2017

Craig Crews, PhD will be honored by the American Association for Cancer Research at the annual meeting in April with the Outstanding Achievement in Chemistry in Cancer Research Award.

Tae Kon Kim, MD, PhD is the recipient of an American Society of Hematology Scholar Award. The title of the proposal is "Overcoming immune evasion in acute myeloid leukemia with antibody dependent cell cytotoxicity by PD-1H targeting and an immune modulator, anti-4-1BB antibody." The award will provide $100,000 to fund his research for two years.

Dr. Clarence Sasaki recently received the Giotakis-Psyrri Award from the Hellenic Society of Head and Neck Cancer.

Congratulations to the 2017 Lion Heart grant recipients: Jian Cao, PhD: Targeting KDM5s to Enhance the Response to Immune Checkpoint Inhibition in Breast Cancer; Rosa Munoz Xicola, PhD: New DNA Repair Alterations in Hereditary Breast Cancer Susceptibility; Zhong Yun, PhD: A Novel Genetic Model of Tumor Hypoxia for Breast Cancer

The National Organization of American Italian Women honored Patricia LoRusso, DO at its eighth annual Epiphany Celebration brunch. Dr. LoRusso was chosen as an honoree for her significant advances in medical oncology, drug development, and early phase clinical trials.

December 2016

Dr. Andrea Silber was awarded The CT Cancer Partnership 2016 Cancer Champion Award. The award recognizes contributions to cancer prevention and control in the state of Connecticut.

Janaki Parameswaran, MD, received the ECOG-ACRIN Young Investigator Symposium Award for Translational Research

Roy S. Herbst, MD, PhD will receive the International Association for the Study of Lung Cancer (IASLC) Paul A. Bunn, Jr. Scientific Award

November 2016

Jennifer Kapo, MD was appointed by the Commissioner of the Connecticut Department of Public Health, Raul Pino, MD, to the state's Palliative Care Advisory Council.

October 2016

Under the leadership of Dr. Hari Deshpande, Yale Cancer Center/Smilow Cancer Hospital have been accepted as a member institution of SARC, a collaboration of researchers and clinical teams around the country working together to cure sarcoma.
Tara Sanft, MD has been selected as Vice Chair of the NCCN Survivorship Panel.
Mario Sznol, MD is the newly elected President Elect of the Society for Immunotherapy of Cancer.

Rogerio Lilenbaum, MD has been named Chair of the Data Safety Monitoring Board (DSMB) for Alliance Foundation Trials (AFT).

September 2016

Lisa Fucito, PhD, along with co-investigators Lynn Tanoue, MD and Steven Bernstein, MD, has received funding for a new R01 focused on tobacco cessation for lung cancer patients, Gain-framed Messages and NRT Sampling to Promote Smoking Cessation in Lung Cancer Screening Programs.

Jun Deng, PhD, received an R01 Grant from the NIH. The title of his project is "Tracking Organ Doses for Patient Safety in Radiation Therapy."

Dr. Xiaomei Ma and Dr. Nikolai Podoltsev will begin a two-year research project entitled "Myeloproliferative neoplasms: etiology, patterns of care, and outcomes." This $269K project will begin on October 1, 2016 and is being funded through generous support from the Frederick A. DeLuca Foundation.

Susan Kaech, PhD has been named as the Waldemar Von Zedtwitz Professor of Immunobiology at Yale School of Medicine.

Qin Yan, PhD has been awarded a Department of Defense Peer Reviewed Cancer Research Program Idea Award ($665,999 total). The title of this project is "Dissecting the Roles of ARID2 Tumor Suppressor in Metastatic Melanoma."

Shang-Min Zhang, PhD, has been awarded a Department of Defense Peer Reviewed Cancer Research Program Horizon Award ($124,874 total). The title of her project is "Epigenetic Regulation of Histone Demethylase JARID1B in Melanoma."

Scott Huntington, MD, MPH, has received a Mentored Career Development Award (KL2) from the NIH to support his research abstract, "Curbing unnecessary diagnostic imaging: Barriers to adopting non-imaging based routine surveillance for patients with lymphoma."

John Roberts, MD, has been named executive chair of Yale University's Institutional Review Board (IRB), effective January 1.

August 2016

Ranjit Bindra, MD, PhD, a member of our Radiobiology and Radiotherapy Research Program, has received a $50k grant from the Pablove Foundation.

Brian Shuch, MD, a member of our Developmental Therapeutics Research Program, has received a Career Development Award (K08) Grant from the National Cancer Institute to support his work to study "Genomic Heterogeneity and the Small Renal Mass."

Yale New Haven Children's Hospital is one of 18 recipients across the country to receive a 2016 Hyundai Impact Grant from Hyundai Hope On Wheels®. The $50,000 Impact Grant was presented to Gary Kupfer, MD, Clinical Program Leader, Pediatric Hematology & Oncology Program at Smilow Cancer Hospital.

July 2016

Erin Hofstatter, MD, is one of 13 recipients of the 2016 National Cancer Institute (NCI) Cancer Clinical Investigator Team Leadership Award (CCITLA). The award recognizes and supports outstanding mid-career clinical investigators at NCI-designated Cancer Centers who are working to improve the lives of people with cancer through extensive involvement in NCI-funded collaborative clinical trials and whose leadership, participation and activities promote clinical trials and research.

Lynn D. Wilson, MD, MPH, FASTRO, has been elected Education Council Vice-Chair of the American Society of Radiation Oncology (ASTRO).

Sidi Chen, PhD, a member of our Genomics, Genetics, and Epigenetics Research Program, has received a one-year grant from the St. Baldrick's Foundation to study medulloblastoma, the most common malignant pediatric brain tumor.

Steven Bernstein, MD, has received a 4-year, $2.7 million R01 entitled 'Optimizing Tobacco Dependence Treatment in the Emergency Department.'

Yale School of Medicine awarded The Francis Gilman Blake Award for outstanding teaching of the medical sciences to Anthony Kim, MD, Associate Professor of Surgery (Thoracic Surgery).

June 2016

Yale Medical Oncology and Hematology graduating fellows were honored with a dinner at Union League Café hosted by Drs. Roy Herbst, Madhav Dhodapkar, Jill Lacy, Nikolai Podoltsev, and Michael Hurwitz. Dr. Noffar Bar, Dr. Tae Kon Kim, and Dr. Carolyn Presley each received a Research Award recognizing their outstanding work. Also, Dr. Sarah Mougalian and Dr. Terri Parker were presented with the 2016 David S. Fischer Teaching Awards for Outstanding Faculty Teaching and Mentoring of Fellow in Medical Oncology.

Miguel F. Sanmamed, MD, PhD has been awarded the 2016 SITC-AstraZeneca Cancer Immunotherapy Clinical Fellowship in Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer (NSCLC) for his project entitled, "Identifying primary and acquired resistance mechanism to PD-1/PD-L1 pathway blockade in non-small cell lung cancer patients using immune-patient-derived xenograft model."

Valentina Greco, PhD, has been awarded the American Society for Cell Biology Early Career Life Scientist Award. The award supports an outstanding cell biologist who has served as an independent investigator for no more than seven years.

Lisa Shomsky, MBA, RN, CNML has been appointed as the inaugural Clinical Program Director, Smilow at Bridgeport.

Roy S. Herbst, MD, PhD, Associate Director for Translational Research and Chief of Medical Oncology presented on The Master Protocol in Oncology: Lessons Learned, at the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute workshop on Enhancing Treatments for Pulmonary Vascular Diseases.

May 2016

Alfred Lee, MD, PhD was the recipient of this year's Charles W. Bohmfalk Teaching Prize for teaching in the basic sciences, in recognition of his efforts in teaching medical students.

Melinda Irwin, PhD, MPH, Associate Director of Population Sciences and Co-Director of Cancer Prevention and Control, has been awarded a R25 Grant from the NCI.

Jonathan Ellman, PhD, was awarded the Dylan Hixon '88 Prize for Teaching Excellence in the Natural Sciences and Mathematics from Yale University.

Jerry Malefatto, MD, received the Clarence F. Heimann Leadership Award.

Mark Lemmon, PhD, has been elected a Fellow of the Royal Society, the United Kingdom's national academy of science. The Society recognizes Dr. Lemmon's research into basic biochemistry and biophysics questions, which has yielded significant insights within the fields of cell signaling and cancer research.

Dr. Stephan Ariyan, has been named as the Frank F. Kanthak Professor in Plastic Surgery.
Learn More >>

Fae Willett, RN, a nurse at the Smilow Cancer Hospital Care Center in Fairfield, was honored with a Nightingale Award for Excellence in Nursing.

Amy Vollono, RN, a nurse on our inpatient unit on NP 11 is the recipient of a DAISY Award from the DAISY Foundation for her outstanding compassion, advocacy, and care of patients.

Joan A. Steitz, PhD, will be honored on May 26 with the Jonathan Kraft Prize for Excellence in Cancer Research at Massachusetts General Hospital Cancer Center.

April 2016

Abhijit Patel, PhD, received an R01 grant from the NCI to study "Circulating DNA as a Marker of Treatment Efficacy and Failure in Lung Cancer."


Shiyi Wang, MD, PhD, received an award from the Patient Centered Outcomes Research Institute (PCORI).


Amy Justice, MD, PhD, Professor of Medicine and Public Health and Section Chief of Internal Medicine at the VA Connecticut Healthcare System, has been awarded an R01 grant from the NIH to study HIV and Aging Mechanisms for Hepatocellular Cancer.


Akiko Iwasaki, PhD, has been newly named as the Waldemar Von Zedtwitz Professor of Immunobiology and of Molecular, Cellular, and Developmental Biology (MCDB).


Carlos Oliveira, MD, Clinical Fellow in Pediatrics, has received a grant from the American Cancer Society to support his project on the "Clinical Effectiveness of Human Papillomavirus Vaccine." Linda Niccolai, PhD and Eugene Shapiro, MD are mentors on the project.


Lajos Pusztai, MD, has been named a Susan G. Komen Scholar and has also received a Leadership Grant from the organization.


Rogerio Lilenbaum, MD, Chief Medical Officer of Smilow Cancer Hospital and Professor of Medicine, has been named a Fellow of the American Society of Clinical Oncology (FASCO).


Joseph "Yossi" Schlessinger, PhD, has been named to the 2016 Class of Fellows of the American Association of Cancer Research (AACR) Academy.


Patricia LoRusso, DO, Associate Director for Innovation and Professor of Medicine, was recently elected to the Association of American Physicians (AAP).


Harriet Kluger, MD, Professor of Medicine, has been named to the American Society for Clinical Investigation (ASCI).


Joann Sweasy, PhD, has announced the winners of Yale Cancer Center's annual Pilot and Co-Pilot Awards:


Pilot Awards: Alfred Bothwell, PhD, Ann Haberman, PhD, Beth A. Jones, PhD, MPH, Wu Liu, PhD, James. B. Yu, MD, MHS, Scott Huntington, MD, MPH, Mark Solomon, PhD


Co-Pilot Awards: Ranjit S. Bindra, MD, PhD and Co-PI: W. Mark Saltzman, PhD, Joseph Piepmeier, MD, Anita Huttner, MD, Rong Fan, PhD


Don Nguyen, PhD received a Department of Defense IDEA Award, which supports "conceptually innovative high-risk/high-reward research" (2 years, $350,000). His lab's proposal, "The Extracellular Matrix as a Companion Therapeutic Target in Metastatic Lung Cancer," will study how novel therapies can be used to modify the microenvironment of metastasis from lung cancer.


Sally Adua has been selected as the 2016/17 recipient of the George Robert Pfeiffer Fellowship. Sally is identifying the molecular and physiological mechanisms, which link drug resistance to brain metastasis in EGFR mutant lung cancers.


Aarti Bhatia, MD, MPH, Assistant Professor of Medical Oncology in the Head and Neck Cancers Program, has been approved for grant funding by the National Comprehensive Cancer Network (NCCN) for her proposal "Single-Arm Phase II Trial of Dual Inhibition of EGFR with Afatinib and Cetuximab with Correlative Studies in the Second Line Treatment of Recurrent or Metastatic Squamous Cell Cancers of the Head and Neck."

March 2016

Katie Politi, Assistant Professor of Pathology, is the 2017 awardee of the Ramsey Cotran Early Career Investigator Award from the American Association of Investigative Pathologists. This is a highly competitive and prestigious award recognizing outstanding young investigators for their contributions to understanding the conceptual basis of disease.


Congratulations to Yale Cancer Center's Murat Gunel, Akiko Iwasaki, and Anna Marie Pyle who have been inducted in the 2016 membership of The Connecticut Academy of Science and Engineering.


Susan J. Baserga is the winner of this year's American Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology William C. Rose Award for her valuable contributions to the field of ribosome biogenesis research and her dedication as a teacher and a mentor.


Alliance for Cancer Gene Therapy (ACGT) has announced that Samuel Katz, MD, PhD has been awarded a 2016 ACGT Young Investigator Grant to support his research on the Use of RNA to Kill Blood Cancers.


Lynne Regan, PhD has been selected as an honoree in the 2016 Women of Innovation® program by the Connecticut Technology Council.

February 2016

Dr. Alfred Bothwell received a grant from the Pardee Foundation to fund the Development of human lung cancer metastasis model in mice. The goal of Dr. Bothwell's research project is to establish a humanized mouse model of human lung cancer and test the hypothesis that Dkk-1 is a driver of cancer metastasis.

Dr. Cary Gross and Dr. Sarah Mougalian received a grant from the National Comprehensive Cancer Network (NCCN) Oncology Research Program, in collaboration with Pfizer, to study Optimizing Patient Engagement in Reporting Outcomes among Women with Metastatic Breast Cancer.

Ranjit Bindra, MD, PhD received an American Cancer Society Research Scholar Grant ($792,000) over 4 years for his project "Pre-clinical Development of Mibefradil as a Novel Glioma Radiosensitizer."

Wu Liu, PhD received a grant from the Elsa U. Pardee Foundation for his research project "Nanoparticle-enhanced focused kV x-ray Radiotherapy: Monte Carlo dosimetry modeling."

Edward Snyder, MD was selected to receive The Richard J. Davey Lectureship Award.

January 2016

The American Association of Immunologists (AAI) honored Dr. Richard Flavell and Dr. Lieping Chen. Dr. Flavell will be presented with the AAI Excellence in Mentoring Award at the association's annual meeting in May. Dr. Chen will receive the AAI-Steinman Award for Human Immunology Research.
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Nicole Deziel, PhD, MHS received an American Cancer Society Mentored Research Scholar Grant entitled "Exposure to Halogenated Aromatic Compounds and Risk of Thyroid Cancer."

Francine Foss, MD received a $200,000 grant from the Spatz Foundation to support her research proposal "Chemokine Receptor Antagonists for Cutaneous T cell Lymphoma."

The Breast Cancer Alliance recently awarded two grants to members of the Breast Center. The first is to Dr. Brigid Killelea to support the Breast Center's Interdisciplinary Breast Fellowship Program for the 2016-17 year. Dr. Andrea Silber also received an education and outreach grant from the Alliance to support her outreach efforts in the community from the Breast Center. Congratulations to both Dr. Killelea and Dr. Silber for their efforts


The 2016 Small Projects to Improve Patient Care grant recipients, funded through the Closer to Free Fund, have been announced. Chosen by committee chaired by Ruth McCorkle, RN, PhD, Assistant Director for Psychosocial Oncology, the following projects have been funded:

  • Jane Jeuland, Palliative Care Chaplain - Beyond Why.org: Online Social Support for Oncology Staff
  • Dana Shaffer, Art Expression Coordinator - Development of an Anthology of Patient Stories written during personal story writing workshops
  • Lisa Barbarotta, APRN-BC, Nurse Practitioner - IMPACT- Improving the mindset and perceptions about cancer together: An educational conference for young adults living with cancer
  • Taylor Healey, BSN, RN, North Pavilion 12 - Respite Room for patients and families

Congratulations to the 2016 Lion Heart Grant recipients! The grant committee reviewed several outstanding applications and chose the following three projects for funding:

Preclinical Evaluation of Candidate Drug Combinations for Treatment of Triple Negative Breast Cancer; David F. Stern, PhD

Targeting CaSR/GABABR1 Heterodimers to Treat Bone Metastases in Breast Cancer; John J Wysolmerski, MD

How Does Na+/I Symporter (NIS) Expression in Metastatic Breast Cancer Correlate with Histopathological, Biological and Clinical Parameters?; Nancy Carrasco, MD

Congratulations to Yale Cancer Center's 2015-16 American Cancer Society Institutional Research Grant award winners:

Sidi Chen, PhD - Department of Genetics & Systems Biology Institute Investigating Functional Roles of MIR-345 in Cancer Metastasis

Nadya Dimitrova, PhD- Department of Molecular, Cellular and Developmental Biology The roles of p53-regulated long non-coding RNAs in tumorigenesis

Smita Krishnaswamy, PhD- Department of Genetics Understanding and Disrupting Dynamic Rewiring in Signaling and Gene Regulatory Pathways during the Epithelial-to-Mesenchymal Transition

Christos Hatzis, PhD- Section of Medical Oncology Exploring the dynamics of

de-differentiation in breast cancer cells

Matthew Strout, MD, PhD- Section of Hematology Therapeutic targeting of programmed DNA damage in B cell lymphoma

December 2015

Congratulations to the 2015 Leslie H. Warner Postdoctoral Fellowship Award Winners:

Katherine Amato, PhD- Faculty mentors: Katie Politi and Susan Kaech “Mechanisms of response and resistance to immune checkpoint inhibitors in lung adenocarcinoma”

Soo Seok (Steve) Hwang, PhD- Faculty mentor: Richard Flavell “A molecular study of transcription factor Hhex mediated Treg development”

Alice Gaudin, PhD- Faculty mentor: Mark Saltzman “PEGylated Squalenoyl-Gemcitabine nanoparticles for the treatment of glioblastoma”

Lizhen Wu, PhD- Faculty mentor: Qin Yan “The regulation of alternative polyadenylation by JARID1 in breast cancer”

The Lung Cancer Research Foundation (LCRF) awarded Kurt Schalper, MD, PhD, a $75,000 grant to support Quantitative analysis of the PD-1 axis components and immune infiltrates in lung cancer: predictive role and therapeutic implications at their annual lung cancer awareness luncheon.

November 2015

Congratulations to the 2015 Leslie H. Warner Postdoctoral Fellowship Award Winners:

Katherine Amato, PhD- Faculty mentors: Katie Politi and Susan Kaech “Mechanisms of response and resistance to immune checkpoint inhibitors in lung adenocarcinoma”

Soo Seok (Steve) Hwang, PhD- Faculty mentor: Richard Flavell “A molecular study of transcription factor Hhex mediated Treg development”

Alice Gaudin, PhD- Faculty mentor: Mark Saltzman “PEGylated Squalenoyl-Gemcitabine nanoparticles for the treatment of glioblastoma”

Lizhen Wu, PhD- Faculty mentor: Qin Yan “The regulation of alternative polyadenylation by JARID1 in breast cancer”

The Lung Cancer Research Foundation (LCRF) awarded Kurt Schalper, MD, PhD, a $75,000 grant to support Quantitative analysis of the PD-1 axis components and immune infiltrates in lung cancer: predictive role and therapeutic implications at their annual lung cancer awareness luncheon.

October 2015

Congratulations to this year's presenters at the San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium being held December 8-12. Click here to view Yale presenters.

Dr. Murat Gunel, Nixdorff-German Professor of Neurosurgery and Professor of Genetics and of Neurobiology and Chief, Department of Neurosurgery, Yale-New Haven Hospital, has been elected to the National Academy of Medicine. Dr. Günel's clinical expertise in neurosurgery focuses on treating complex brain aneurysms and vascular malformations, as well as brain tumors. Learn More >>

The National Cancer Institute has named Craig Crews, PhD, a recipient of its Outstanding Investigator Award. Dr. Crews, the L. B. Cullman Professor of Molecular, Cellular, and Developmental Biology, was one of 60 US scientists to receive the award, which brings $4.2 million over seven years to support his lab's research. Learn More >>

The International Society of Gastrointestinal Oncology (ISGIO) has named Howard Hochster, MD, as president elect. Dr. Hochster, Professor of Medical Oncology; Associate Director for Clinical Sciences at Yale Cancer Center; and Director of the Gastrointestinal Cancers Program at Smilow Cancer Hospital at Yale-New Haven, will serve a two-year term as president-elect followed by two years as president. Learn More >>

Dr. Henry Park was a recipient of the Resident Digital Poster Recognition Award at the ASTRO Annual Meeting in San Antonio, TX last week. His poster, Higher Facility Case Volume of Stereotactic Body Radiation Therapy Is Associated With Improved Overall Survival in Clinical Stage I Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer, was presented during the Lung Cancer session of the meeting.

Congratulations to the 2015 ASTRO presenters. The conference this year is being held October 18-21st in San Antonio. View Yale sessions

Gary Kupfer, MD has received a $250,000 Scholar Grant from the Hyundai Hope on Wheels Program. Dr. Kupfer will use the funding to screen the Fanconi anemia pathway to identify synthetic lethality to find targets in tumors mutant in Fanconi genes. He also hopes to identify pathways to target that will result in protection of children's bone marrow who have the Fanconi anemia bone marrow failure syndrome.

September 2015

Nominations for The Ruth McCorkle Oncology Advanced Practice Provider award are now being accepted.

Dr. Rogerio Lilenbaum has been appointed to the Board of the National Comprehensive Cancer Network.

Yale Cancer Center has received a supplemental grand to our cancer center support grant to support a Community Health Educator to provide clinical trial education and disparity outreach in the New Haven community. The program will be under the direction of Andrea Silber, MD, Beth Jones, PhD, and Melinda Irwin, PhD.

Doximity.com has ranked The Radiation Oncology Residency Program #13 in the nation for reputation in its annual ranking of residency programs. Learn More >>

July 2015

The David S. Fischer, MD annual award for outstanding teaching & mentoring of fellows in Medical Oncology was awarded to Michael E. Hurwitz, MD, PhD.

The David S. Fischer, MD annual award for outstanding teaching & mentoring of fellows in Hematology was awarded to Alfred Lee, MD.

The David S. Fischer, MD annual award to a faculty member of Yale Cancer Center and The Veterans Administration Connecticut Cancer Center for outstanding teaching & mentoring of fellows in Medical Oncology & Hematology was awarded to Natalia Neparidze, MD.

The Medical Oncology & Hematology Fellowship Program annual award for Outstanding Fellow in Research was awarded to Mehmet Altan, MD (Medical Oncology) and

Andrew Branagan, MD (Hematology).

The Trustees of the Edward Mallinckrodt, Jr. Foundation have named Valentina Greco, PhD, the 59th Mallinckrodt Scholar, through a competitive competition. Dr. Greco is a member of Yale Cancer Center's Signal Transduction Program. The funding of the grant commences October 1, 2015 and includes a stipend of $100,000 annually for four years. Women's Health Research at Yale announced their Pilot Project funding for 2015, and Yale Cancer Center's Christine J. Ko, MD, Associate Professor of Dermatology and Pathology, has been awarded a grant in collaboration with Yale Cancer Center to study skin cancer. Her research project aims to identify a biological marker to predict the growth rate and recurrence of cutaneous squamous cell carcinoma. Dr. Ko's research team's current target is a mutated gene they believe marks the difference between a slow-growing cancer and a more aggressive one.

The Women's Faculty Forum at Yale recently selected 20 faculty members across the university to work with journalists from The OpEd Project. Congratulations to Dr. Laura J. Morrison from the Yale Palliative Care Program and Dr. Anees Chagpar, Director of the Breast Center at Smilow Cancer Hospital, who have been selected to participate in The Public Voices Fellowship at Yale University.

May 2015

Congratulations to Joseph Contessa MD, PhD and Evan Morris, PhD, co-principal investigators on a new R01 from the National Cancer Institute, "Validation of Quantitative 11C-Erlotinib PET for Imaging EGFR-Mutant Lung Cancer." Their project will be done in collaboration with Sarah Goldberg, MD, MPH, and is the first NIH funded collaboration between Yale Cancer Center and the Yale PET Center. The 3-year grant totals over $750,000.

Dr. Andrea Silber has received a $35,000 grant from Avon Foundation for Women at AVON 39 The Walk to End Breast Cancer. The grant will provide patient navigation to medically underserved metastatic breast cancer patients to help them access care and make informed health care decisions.

Congratulations to Sarah Goldberg, MD, Assistant Professor of Medicine (Medical Oncology), the recipient of this year's Charles A. Coltman, Jr., Fellowship from the SWOG/Hope Foundation. Dr. Goldberg also received the first SWOG Trial Support, or STrS, award, which will provide critical bridge funding for the S1403 lung cancer trial now in protocol development.

The Clinical Research Forum awarded its top honor to Yale Cancer Center's Dr. Roy Herbst for a paper he co-authored on immune therapy for multiple types of cancer. The top prize, The Herbert Pardes Clinical Research Achievement Award, was awarded for a team-written paper published last November in the journal Nature. Dr. Herbst was first author of the paper that reported how the presence of PD-L1, an immune-suppressing protein in non-cancerous immune cells, may predict how patients will respond to treatment. Learn More >>

Qin Yan, PhD, a member of the Cancer Genetics and Genomics Program, has been awarded another NCI R21 grant ($398,352 total) to study the roles of epigenetic mechanisms of drug resistance. The title of the project is "Identifying epigenetic changes critical for trastuzumab resistance." The project will be done in collaboration with

D rs. David Stern, Narendra Wajapeyee, Michael DiGiovanna, and David Rimm.

Nancy Carrasco, MD, Professor of Cellular and Molecular Physiology and a member of Yale Cancer Center's Cancer Genetics and Genomics Program, has been elected into the National Academy of Sciences, one of the highest honors bestowed upon scientists.

Dr. Roy Herbst recently was elected to the Association of American Physicians (AAP), one of North America's oldest medical honor societies. Dr. Vincent T. DeVita, Jr. nominated Dr. Herbst for membership. "Being elected to the AAP is a great honor richly deserved by Roy Herbst whose research with targeted therapy and immunotherapy of lung cancer has had a significant impact on the field of cancer treatment," Dr. DeVita said. Learn More >>

April 2015

Richard Edelson, MD, the Aaron B. and Marguerite Lerner Professor of Dermatology and Chair of the department, received the 2015 Discovery Award during the annual meeting of the Dermatology Foundation on March 21 in San Francisco. The award recognizes an outstanding investigator "whose research accomplishments have greatly impacted the understanding of cutaneous biology, identified a previously unrecognized disease, or developed a revolutionary new therapy."

Read More >>

Congratulations to Richard Lifton, MD, PhD, who has been named Co-Chair of the President's Precision Medicine Initiative research network. Formed as a Working Group of the Advisory Committee to the NIH Director (ACD), the team of experts will deliver a preliminary report in September 2015 that will inform efforts to accelerate the understanding of individual differences that play a role in health, with the goal of informing better prevention and treatment strategies tailored for each person.

Wendelin Nelson, Pharm D, BCOP has been recognized by the Oncology Nursing Society (ONS), as the recipient of the 2015 ONS Susan Baird Excellence in Clinical Writing Award. Wendelin is being recognized as the first author for her article entitled "Development of a Policy and Procedure for Accidental Chemotherapy Overdose" that appeared in the August 2014 issue of Clinical Journal of Oncology Nursing. The award will be presented to Dr. Nelson during the ONS Annual Congress April 23-26, in Orlando, FL.

Edward Snyder, MD has published Hematopoietic Stem Cell Transplantation: A Handbook for Clinicians as an editor of the text.

Maysa Abu-Khalaf, MD, recently participated in a Breast Cancer in the Arab World 2015 conference in Amman, Jordan as a moderator and a panelist. The Jordan Breast Program under the leadership of HRH Princess Dina Mired organized the conference.

March 2015

Evan Morris, PhD, a member of Yale Cancer Center's Radiobiology and Radiotherapy Program, has been awarded a Fulbright Scholar grant to conduct research and teach next winter at Hadassah Hospital and Hebrew University in Jerusalem.

Smilow Cancer Hospital Hematology Program staff, friends, and families were recently recognized as a 1st place corporate team by the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society for their efforts raising over $2000 to support the Society in its annual Light the Night Walk at Lighthouse Point.

Congratulations to Yale Cancer Center members Peter Glazer, Craig Crews, and Vasilis Vasiliou, who were recently elected into the Connecticut Academy of Science and Engineering. Election to the Academy is on the basis of scientific and engineering distinction achieved through significant contributions in scientific and engineering excellence.

Many Yale Cancer Center faculty members participated in the 15th Annual Targeted Therapies of Lung Cancer Meeting in Santa Monica, CA last week, co-chaired by Roy Herbst, MD, PhD. Sponsored by the International Association for the Study of Lung Cancer, the invitation-only meeting gathers the top scientists to discuss the latest advances in the treatment of lung cancer with targeted therapies.

February 2015

Joseph Schlessinger, PhD, the William H. Prusoff Professor of Pharmacology has been awarded the 2015 Frontiers of Knowledge Award in Biomedicine from the Madrid-based BBVA Foundation in recognition of his work leading to the first personalized treatments for cancer. Dr. Schlessinger shares the prize with Tony Hunter of the Salk Institute and Charles L. Sawyers, MD, of Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, for "carving out the path that led to the development of a new class of successful cancer drugs." Read More >>

Pasquale Patrizio, MD, Professor of Obstetrics, Gynecology & Reproductive Sciences and Director of Fertility Preservation Program and a member of the Yale Cancer Center Developmental Therapeutics Program, has been elected President of the International Society for Fertility Preservation.

Qin Yan, PhD, Associate Professor of Pathology and a member of Yale Cancer Center's Genetics and Genomics Research Program, has been awarded R21 Grant from the National Cancer Institute to study the roles of epigenetic regulators in breast cancer metastasis. The $398,352 grant will be conducted in collaboration with Drs. Don Nguyen, Narendra Wajapeyee, and David Rimm.

January 2015

The Breast Center at Smilow Cancer Hospital has received Three-Year Full Accreditation from the American College of Surgeons, National Accreditation Program for Breast Centers. NAPBC Accreditation is the seal of approval for breast centers from the American College of Surgeons and formally acknowledges their commitment to providing the highest quality evaluation and management of patients with breast disease. Learn More>>

Narendra Wajapeyee, PhD, Assistant Professor of Pathology and a member of the Yale Cancer Center Signal Transduction Program, has received a R21 grant from National Cancer Institute to study the role of metabolic alteration in melanoma biology and therapy. The $400,000 grant is in collaboration with investigators Gary Cline and Yuval Kluger. Dr. Wajapeyee also received a research grant award from Hirshberg Foundation for Pancreatic Cancer research to identify the drivers of pancreatic cancer. Xiaoyong Yang, PhD, Associate Professor of Comparative Medicine and a member of the Yale Cancer Center Signal Transduction Program, has received an American Cancer Society Research Scholar Grant to study the Control of Cancer Metabolism by O-Linked Glycosylation. The four-year grant totals $792,000.

Narendra Wajapeyee, PhD, Assistant Professor of Pathology and a member of the Yale Cancer Center Signal Transduction Program, has received a R21 grant from National Cancer Institute to study the role of metabolic alteration in melanoma biology and therapy. The $400,000 grant is in collaboration with investigators Gary Cline and Yuval Kluger. Dr. Wajapeyee also received a research grant award from Hirshberg Foundation for Pancreatic Cancer research to identify the drivers of pancreatic cancer.

Xiaoyong Yang, PhD, Associate Professor of Comparative Medicine and a member of the Yale Cancer Center Signal Transduction Program, has received an American Cancer Society Research Scholar Grant to study the Control of Cancer Metabolism by O-Linked Glycosylation. The four-year grant totals $792,000.

The National Cancer Institute has awarded Don Nguyen, PhD, Assistant Professor of Pathology and a member of the Signal Transduction Research Program, a 5-year R01 grant ($1,724,760 total), to study the role of metabolic stress in lung cancer metastasis. This project will be performed in collaboration with Gary Cline and Qin Yan. The title of the grant is "A novel lineage pathway controls metabolic adaptation by metastatic lung cancers."

Congratulations to Abhijit Patel, MD, PhD, Assistant Professor of Therapeutic Radiology and a member of the Radiobiology and Radiotherapy Program. Dr. Patel has received a $200K grant from the Brozman Foundation to study "Ultrasensitive detection of tumor DNA in blood for early diagnosis of ovarian cancer."

The annual Lion Heart Grants for Breast Cancer Research were awarded to three Yale Cancer Center investigators for 2015:

Donald Engelman, PhD:Targeting Chemotherapy in Breast Cancer: Weakly-acidic prodrugs bias drug uptake toward tumors

Vikram Wali, PhD: Exploiting Metabolic Isoenzyme Shifts in Breast Cancer to Discover Novel Therapies

Vikram Wali, PhD and Chistos Hatzis, PhD: Evaluation of New Treatment Strategy for Triple Negative Breast Cancer Involving Combinations of Cancer Stem Cell Specific Drugs and Standard Chemotherapy At the Annual American Society of Hematology Conference in December, the following students received abstract achievement awards: Linette Bosques, Amalyah Figueroa, Chad Sanada, Alexandra Teixeira, Siying Zou, Shiny Nair, and Roger Kim.