Dear Friend of the Englander Institute for Precision Medicine,
Welcome to our first quarterly external newsletter of 2023!
Thank you for signing up on our website to receive this newsletter, we hope you enjoy learning more about the important progress we’ve made towards our mission since last year.
It’s been a remarkably productive first quarter, with staff winning numerous high-profile awards, participating in significant collaborative events, generating strong news media attention, and publishing impactful research on Covid-19, spinal pathologies, aging, atrial fibrillation, bacterial sepsis-induced ARDS and more–some of which is highlighted below. The hard work and dedication of our colleagues inspires me every day.
We just published a new animated video about the EIPM, which I hope you enjoy and will share with friends and colleagues! You can find it on our website, X (Twitter), Facebook page, and Youtube channel.
February 11th was International Day of Women and Girls in Science, and March 8th was International Women’s Day. We recognized both events on our social media channels by honoring some of the many women who inspire us every day of the year!
Our important work is only possible because of the financial support we receive from foundations, government agencies, corporate partners, and the individual donors who make all of these discoveries and breakthroughs possible.
Thank you again for your interest in our work!
Sincerely,
Olivier Elemento, Ph.D.
EIPM Director
News & Awards
Dr. Majd Al Assaad, a Senior Research Fellow in the Pathology and Laboratory Medicine department, and an EIPM Member, earned a 2023 AACR-Bristol Myers Squibb Scholar-in-Training Award in February.
Dr. Bishoy Faltas earned a new Starr Cancer Consortium award in February to study “Targeting cytidine deaminase-induced chromosomal instability as a driver of metastasis in bladder cancer.”
Our Associate Director for Precision Immunology Dr. Laura Santambrogio won an Amaranth Prize in February that rewards the most impactful research in longevity for her paper exploring the “Role of Carbonyl Modifications on Aging-Associated Protein Aggregation.”
Our Director for Liquid Biopsy Research Dr. Pashtoon Kasi became the first ever Chair of the International Society of Liquid Biopsy’s Communications Committee on February 14th!
NanoString Technologies announced a new collaboration with Weill Cornell Medicine and the EIPM in February to create a comprehensive spatial atlas of human anatomy, the first comprehensive spatial atlas of healthy human tissue from multiple organs, including multi-cell and single cell resolution using both GeoMx and CosMx.
Dr. Kristy A. Brown was interviewed for the article “Is Obesity Especially Dangerous for Women at Genetic Risk for Breast Cancer?” about new research published in Science Translational Medicine that appeared in HealthDay in February.
Congratulations to our colleague Dr. Ekta Khurana on her new federal grant, announced in March, to study how prostate cells evolve to become resistant to treatment!
Congratulations to Dr. Lisa Newman, Chief, Section of Breast Surgery, and an EIPM Member, on being selected last month to the 2023 Castle Connolly list of Top Black Physicians!
It was a real pleasure to be interviewed for, and included within, the article “Why These 10 Brilliant Professors & Researchers Are Focusing on AI,” published by LDV Capital in March.
Events
Our colleague Dr. Daniela Guevara presented an EIPM Precision Medicine Conference lecture, “Unusual Presentation of Advanced Urothelial Cancer in a Young Patient,” in January.
Dr. Karsten Suhre presented a WCM Research Cores Seminar, “Discovery of COVID-Associated Proteins in a Joint WCM-NY and Qatar Collaboration Using the OLINK platform,” in January. Dr. Suhre also organized a WCM-Qatar Weekly Research Seminar, “Non-invasive Methods for Kidney Rejection Prognosis,” in January.
Our Director for Liquid Biopsy Research Dr. Pashtoon Kasi participated in a number of events at ASCO’s recent GU Symposium, including taking over their OncLive Twitter account in January!
Our Scientific Director Dr. Massimo Cristofanilli presented “Molecular Heterogeneity and Evolution of Luminal Breast Cancer: Clinical and Therapeutic Challenges,” during an MCC Experimental Therapeutics Research Program Meeting in January.
The 2023 Health Hackathon, organized by Entrepreneurship at Cornell and WCM’s Clinical & Translational Science Center, took place in February and involved diverse student teams from the EIPM, Cornell in Ithaca, Weill Cornell Medicine, Memorial Sloan Kettering, Cornell Tech and more who worked to develop creative solutions to human health & wellness problems. Congratulations to all who participated!
Congratulations to Dr. Francesca Khani from the Pathology and Laboratory Medicine department, and an EIPM Member, and all of our colleagues who participated in last month’s very successful 2023 USCAP conference!
I was honored to kick off the Owkin Science ‘Unprecedented Connections’ lecture series in March to share why spatialomics is poised to deliver major scientific breakthroughs in the coming years. I also presented an “Integrative Physiology Seminar Series,” lecture in March before the Baylor College of Medicine’s Department of Integrative Physiology.
Publications
Clinical Director Dr. Cora N. Sternberg published several papers this past quarter, including “Safety Profile of Ipatasertib Plus Abiraterone vs. Placebo Plus Abiraterone in Metastatic Castration-resistant Prostate Cancer,” in Clinical Genitourinary Cancer in February, and “Nadir Prostate-specific Antigen as an Independent Predictor of Survival Outcomes: A Post Hoc Analysis of the PROSPER Randomized Clinical Trial,” in The Journal of Urology in March.
The article “Tumor-intrinsic IRE1α signaling controls protective immunity,” was published by Dr. Vivek Mittal, Professor of Cardiothoracic Surgery and an EIPM Member, with our colleagues Drs. Bhavneet Bhinder, Akanksha Verma, Nasser Altorki and myself in Nature Communications in January.
“Population-Level Prevalence of Rare Variants Associated With Atrial Fibrillation and its Impact on Patient Outcomes,” was published by Dr. Scott Kulm, myself and WCM colleagues in Clinical Electrophysiology in January, and “Identification of Novel Genetic Markers for the Risk of Spinal Pathologies: A Genome-Wide Association Study of 2 Biobanks,” was published by Drs. Scott Kulm and myself, in The Journal of Bone and Joint Surgery, in March.
“Facts and Perspectives: Implications of tumor glycolysis on immunotherapy response in triple negative breast cancer,” was published by EIPM members Drs. Kristy A. Brown and Eleni Andreopoulou, with WCM colleagues including Dr. Sandra Demaria from Pathology and Laboratory Medicine, in Frontiers in Oncology in January, and “Obesity promotes breast epithelium DNA damage in women carrying a germline mutation in BRCA1 or BRCA2,” in Science Translational Medicine by Dr. Kristy A. Brown with EIPM’s Rohan Bareja, myself, and WCM colleagues including Dr. Dilip D. Giri from the Pathology and Laboratory Medicine department in February.
“Cell-of-Origin Targeted Drug Repurposing for Triple-Negative and Inflammatory Breast Carcinoma with HDAC and HSP90 Inhibitors Combined with Niclosamide,” was published in Cancers by our Scientific Director Dr. Massimo Cristofanilli, with Pathology and Laboratory Medicine Drs. Udayan Bhattacharya, Mohammad Kamran and Dr. Marwa Manai in January.
“Urine-based multi-omic comparative analysis of COVID-19 and bacterial sepsis-induced ARDS,” was published in Molecular Medicine by EIPM Member Dr. Jan Krumsiek with Dr. Richa Batra in January.
Dr. Lorenzo Galluzzi from the Meyer Cancer Center and the EIPM published a number of articles this past quarter, including “Meta-hallmarks of aging and cancer,” in Cell Metabolism in January; “Quantitative assessment of mitophagy in irradiated cancer cells,” in Methods in Cell Biology in February; and “Type 1 Interferon Signaling in Malignant Blasts Contributes to Treatment Efficacy in AML Patients,” in Cell Death and Disease in March.
Dr. Nasser Altorki and colleagues published “Lobar or Sublobar Resection for Peripheral Stage IA Non–Small-Cell Lung Cancer,” in The New England Journal of Medicine in February. The article generated news media coverage by Helio on February 8th; HealthDay on February 9th; Medscape on February 8th; Physicians Weekly on February 10th; and a Weill Cornell Medicine Newsroom story on February 8th.
Our Director for Liquid Biopsy Research Dr. Pashtoon Kasi published several articles this past quarter, including “DPYD Testing: Time to Put Patient Safety First,” in the Journal of Clinical Oncology in February; “Types of Liquid Biopsies: Understanding the Different Lenses Through Which They Can Detect Cancer,” in The Oncologist in February; and “Peptide Receptor Radionuclide Therapy in Merkel Cell Carcinoma: A Comprehensive Review,” in the Journal of Nuclear Medicine Technology, in March.
“The broad spectrum of pathogenic autoreactivity,” was published by our Associate Director for Precision Immunology Dr. Laura Santambrogio in Nature Reviews Immunology in March, and she also published “Autoimmunity to the modified self,” in Science in March.
“Cue: a deep-learning framework for structural variant discovery and genotyping,” was authored by Drs. Iman Hajirasouliha and Dmitry Meleshko in Nature Methods in March.
“RBFOX2 modulates a metastatic signature of alternative splicing in pancreatic cancer,” was published by Dr. Tomer M. Yaron of the Meyer Cancer Center, the Department of Medicine, and the EIPM, in Nature in March.
“Combinatorial treatment rescues tumour-microenvironment-mediated attenuation of MALT1 inhibitors in B-cell lymphomas,” was published by a range of Cornell authors including Drs. Wayne Tam and Giorgio Inghirami from the Pathology and Laboratory Medicine department, and the EIPM, with myself, in Nature Materials in March.
“T cell egress via lymphatic vessels is tuned by antigen encounter and limits tumor control,” was published by Drs. Abhinav Jaiswal and Niroshana Anandasabapathy from the Meyer Cancer Center, and the EIPM, in Nature Immunology in March.
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