PRECISION ONCOLOGY CONGRESS

Assistant Professor, Departments of Biochemistry & Molecular Biology and Oncology
University of Calgary
Director, Tumour Biology and Translational Research, Ohlson Research Initiative
Arnie Charbonneau Cancer Institute
Calgary, AB

Dr. Pinaki Bose completed his Ph.D. with Dr. Karl Riabowol at the University of Calgary, investigating the role of the ING1 tumour suppressor protein in DNA damage signaling and apoptosis. After completing his Ph.D., Pinaki joined the Ohlson Research Initiative (ORI) as a postdoctoral fellow and trained in the molecular epidemiology of head and neck cancers under the supervision of Drs. Joseph Dort and Nigel Brockton. As part of a second postdoctoral fellowship, Pinaki trained at the BC Cancer Agency (BCCA) Genome Sciences Centre in cancer genomics and bioinformatics under one of the leading bioinformaticians in the world, Dr. Steven Jones. Pinaki was also a member of the personalized oncogenomics (POG) program at BC Cancer. The POG initiative administers genome-guided targeted therapies to recurrent/metastatic cancer patients.

Dr. Bose currently directs the translational research program within the ORI, a multidisciplinary head and neck cancer research initiative. The Bose lab investigates the biology of head and neck, brain and lung cancers focusing on the role of the immune system in carcinogenesis and progression.

Dr. Sylvan Baca is a medical oncologist at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute. Dr. Baca received his undergraduate degree from Stanford University and his MD and PhD from Harvard Medical School. He trained in Internal Medicine at Brigham and Women’s Hospital and completed his fellowship in Medical oncology at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute. Dr. Baca received his post-doctoral training in cancer epigenetics with Dr. Matthew Freedman at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and the Broad Institute of Harvard and MIT. He is on faculty at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute as a Physician and Translational Investigator. In addition to caring for patients, he conducts research at the interface of computational biology and epigenomics to find better ways to treat cancer.

Ross Camidge, MD PhD

Director of Thoracic Oncology,
Joyce Zeff Chair in Lung Cancer Research
University of Colorado Cancer Centre, Denver, USA

Following a PhD in Molecular Biology at the Medical Research Council’s Laboratory of Molecular Biology at Cambridge University, UK, Dr Camidge completed his medical training at Oxford University, UK. He then became the first person to double train in Medical Oncology and Clinical Pharmacology in the UK, before joining the University of Colorado, USA from October 2005.

Dr Camidge’s main clinical and research interests are thoracic malignancies and developmental therapeutics. The discoveries he and his team have made have changed the standard of care for the treatment of lung cancer multiple times. He has authored over 300 academic publications, including in the Journal of Thoracic Oncology, Lancet Oncology, and New England Journal of Medicine. He has received numerous awards including, in 2012, the Bonnie J. Addario International Lectureship Award for which he was credited as a ‘Luminary in the quest to eradicate lung cancer’. In 2013 he became the first physician to receive the Hank Baskett Sr. Spirit Award, for which he was credited as being ‘one of the leading minds in lung cancer today’. In 2014, he was nationally recognized by The Quality of Life Center at Claremont University in California as an ‘Exemplary mentor in the positive development of junior colleagues in the profession’. In 2016, the Lung Cancer Foundation presented him with the Breath Away From The Cure Award describing him as ‘Simply one of the best in treating lung cancer today’.

Every year since 2017, he has been internationally recognized as a Highly Cited Researcher ranked in the top 1% of all of Clinical Medicine by Clarivate Analytics Web of Science. Every year from 2019 he has ranked at the ‘World Expert’ level by Expertscape for scholars writing about Lung Neoplasms over the past 10 years. He is also the National Medical Director of the Academic Thoracic Oncology Medical Investigators Consortium (ATOMIC) – a collaborative network of 15 US and Canadian sites conducting trials in thoracic oncology, Co-chair of the Elsevier ClinPath (formerly VIA) Oncology Lung Cancer Pathways Committee and a past-member of the National Comprehensive Cancer Network Lung Cancer Committee.

Kim Nguyen Chi, MD FRCPC

Medical Oncologist
Chief Medical Officer
BC Cancer
Vancouver BC

Kim Chi is a medical oncologist and the Chief Medical Officer of BC Cancer, which provides a comprehensive cancer control program for the people of British Columbia (BC), in Canada. He is also Professor in the Faculty of Medicine at the University of British Columbia, a Professor in the Faculty of Health Sciences at Simon Fraser University, and the Shrum Chair in Prostate Cancer Research at BC Cancer.

Prof. Chi’s research in the field of genitourinary cancers focuses on prostate cancer and investigational new drugs, where he has contributed to changing international standards of care practice for patients with advanced prostate cancer.  He also has been investigating circulating tumour DNA as a source of prognostic and predictive biomarkers for patients with metastatic prostate cancer. Prof. Chi is the past-Chair of the Genitourinary Disease Site Committee for the Canadian Cancer Trials Group, and has held peer-reviewed grant funding from the Canada Institutes of Health Research (CIHR), National Cancer Institute of Canada (NCIC)/Canadian Cancer Society (CCS), the US Department of Defence, Movember, Prostate Cancer Foundation (USA), and Prostate Cancer Canada.

Prof. Chi has published over 250 articles in prestigious peer-reviewed journals including the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Annals of Oncology, Nature, the New England Journal of Medicine, and Lancet Oncology.

Staff Scientist, Canada’s Michael Smith Genome Sciences Centre
BC Cancer Research Center
Vancouver BC

I present clearly, connect broadly, spark imagination and encourage enthusiasm for inquiry. I create visuals with analytical clarity and artistic dimensions. In 1999 I built the Genome Sciences Centre’s first computing systems, and later invented port knocking, and optimized keyboard layouts that spawned a Brazilian fashion line. I have an affinity for parody and tragedy. I love rabbit holes. I created Circos (a community standard) and hive plots (a farewell to hairballs). I am triggered by slipshod visualizations of science and pie charts. My information graphics have appeared in the New York Times, Wired and on covers books and scientific journals such as Science, Nature, and PNAS. I am a co-author of the Nature Methods Points of Significance and Points of View columns. I contribute to Scientific American’s Graphic Science and teach how to design scientific figures and scientific posters. My method is critique by redesign. I’ve made maps of nothings in the Universe, shot fashion photography, and found poems in spam. Every year I make Pi Day art, which can be graphics, words or music. I made a music video about infinity, I love typography, and run Hitchmas. I am a former owner of Alex, the world’s most popular rat.

Senior Scientist, Princess Margaret Cancer Centre
Toronto, ON

 Dr. Liu graduated sum laude from the University of Toronto medicine program, followed by residencies at the University of Toronto and a fellowship at the Dana Farber Harvard Cancer Center in Boston. He was Assistant Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School before returning in 2006 to the Ontario Cancer Institute–Princess Margaret Hospital. Dr. Liu’s major research focus is in molecular prognostic factors and pharmacogenomics of lung and esophageal cancer, with additional interest in head and neck, pancreatic, ovarian and testicular cancers, mesothelioma and thymoma. Trained in clinical and molecular epidemiology, he is the principal investigator of over two dozen completed, ongoing and upcoming cancer pharmacogenomic and molecular epidemiologic analyses of cancer observational studies and clinical trials funded by the National Cancer Institute (US), National Cancer Institute of Canada Clinical Trials Group, Canadian Cancer Society Research Institute, the Canadian Institute of Health Research, the Ontario Institute of Cancer Research, Cancer Care Ontario, Doris Duke Foundation and the Lung Cancer Foundation of America. He has research interests in epidemiological outcomes database methods, novel analyses of high dimensionality biologically rich data, pharmacogenomic analyses of conventional and molecularly targeted agents using primary human xenograft models, patient-reported outcomes in pharmacogenomics, and knowledge translation of personalized medicine and pharmacogenomic algorithms into clinical practice.

Professor, Department Of Physiology & Pharmacology
Killam Memorial Chair
Director, IMC Germ-free Program
Cumming School of Medicine
University of Calgary
Calgary, AB

Dr. Kathy McCoy is a Professor in the Department of Physiology and Pharmacology, Cumming School of Medicine, member of the Snyder Institute, Scientific Director of the International Microbiome Center, and holds the Killam Memorial Chair at the University of Calgary, Canada. Her research group uses germ-free and gnotobiotic models to investigate the cellular and molecular mechanisms by which the microbiome regulates host immunity and physiology. She is particularly interested in the dynamic interplay between the gut microbiota and the innate and adaptive immune systems. Her research aims to understand how exposure to intestinal microbes, particularly during early life, educates and regulates the mucosal, systemic and neuronal immune systems and how this can affect susceptibility to diseases, such as allergy, autoimmunity, and neurodevelopmental disorders. Her lab also investigates how the microbiome regulates the immune system throughout life with the aim to identify microbial therapies that can be employed to enhance current therapeutic approaches, such as in cancer.