Who We Fund

TAP Partner

Auron is a platform-powered company targeting cell-state plasticity to improve patient outcomes in oncology and inflammatory disease. Auron uses AI and machine learning to compare cell states and identify novel drug targets, optimal development models, and biomarkers to facilitate proper patient selection, ultimately accelerating the development of effective and durable therapies. 

Project Title

A phase 1 study of AUTX-703, a KAT2A/B degrader, in patients with AML or MDS

Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis

Neha Mehta-Shah, MD, MSCI is an Assistant Professor of Medicine at Washington University in St. Louis where she specializes in peripheral and cutaneous T-cell lymphomas. She completed her undergraduate and medical school at Northwestern University and then completed residency at New York Presbyterian-Weill Cornell Medical Center. She was the chief resident at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center where she subsequently completed fellowship and chief fellowship in medical hematology/oncology in 2016. After joining the faculty at Washington University in St. Louis, she has developed a nationally recognized T-cell lymphoma program and completed a Master's of Science in Clinical Investigation. Having a passion for T-cell lymphoma research since medical school, she has been recognized with multiple awards from ASH, the Lymphoma Research Foundation, the T-cell Leukemia Lymphoma Society, the Alliance as well as a Paul Calabresi K12 Award. She leads multiple trials in T-cell lymphoma nationally including the first US Intergroup Study in untreated peripheral T-cell lymphomas, A0501902.

Program Name(s)

Career Development Program

Project Title

Predictors of response to therapy in A051902, a US Intergroup study of duvelisib+CHO(E)P vs CC-486+CHO(E)P vs CHO(E)P in peripheral T-cell lymphoma

Stanford University

Dr. Collins is a postdoctoral fellow in Dr. Ravi Majeti’s lab at Stanford University and a senior clinical fellow in the Hematology and Oncology Department. Following her undergraduate studies at Williams College, Dr. Collins received her MD/PhD degree at the University of Michigan, where she worked with Dr. Jay Hess studying the role of collaborator proteins in HOXA9-mediated leukemic transformation. Her current research focuses on understanding mechanisms of preleukemic transformation in acute myeloid leukemia (AML) by prospectively modeling mutation acquisition in human hematopoietic stem cells. Throughout her training, Dr. Collins has remained passionate about her career as a physician-scientist, which presents the opportunity to care for patients with hematologic malignancies in the clinic, while also studying these diseases in the lab. Her ultimate goal is to identify a safe and well-tolerated therapy to selectively eradicate preleukemic stem cells and block the formation of AML.

Program Name(s)

Career Development Program

Project Title

Investigating the role of preleukemia duration and clonal burden in progression to AML

Centre Hospitalier Universitaire Vaudois

Caroline Arber obtained her Doctor of Medicine from the University of Basel, Switzerland, and specialized in Internal Medicine and Hematology, with a focus on hematologic malignancies and stem cell transplant. To dive into the T cell engineering field, she moved to the Center for Cell and Gene Therapy, Baylor College of Medicine, USA, where she was a research fellow (2010-2014) and an Assistant Professor (2014-2017). Since 2017 she is an Associate Professor, Research Group leader and Attending Physician at the Lausanne University Hospital, University of Lausanne and Ludwig Institute for Cancer Research Lausanne, Switzerland. She leads a translational research group investigating novel T cell engineering strategies for hematologic malignancies. She also studies the impact of the bone marrow immune microenvironment on outcomes of CAR T cell therapies in myeloma. She has published several last author papers in journals such as Blood, JITC, Cancer Immunology Research, Science Advances.

Program Name(s)

Translational Research Program

Project Title

Designed biosensor to enhance CAR T cell therapy for multiple myeloma

Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis

Dr. Magee directs the pediatric leukemia and lymphoma program at Washington University School of Medicine and St. Louis Children’s Hospital. He received his M.D. and Ph.D. from Washington University and then completed a pediatrics residency and hematology/oncology fellowship at the University of Michigan. He conducted postdoctoral research with Dr. Sean Morrison (Howard Hughes Medical Institute) at the University of Michigan and UT-Southwestern. Dr. Magee’s work focuses on causes and treatments for childhood acute myeloid leukemia. He has published several papers in high impact journals investigating interactions between genes that regulate normal childhood blood development and mutations that cause leukemia, with the goal of understanding why childhood leukemias respond differently to treatment than adult leukemias. He is also investigating changes in blood forming stem cells that lead to leukemia when children receive chemotherapy for other tumors, such as lymphomas or solid tumors.

Program Name(s)

Career Development Program

Project Title

Neonatal origins of pediatric AML

Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center

MD- Hebrew University, Jerusalem. Residencies and Fellowships in Clinical and radiation Oncology in Israel and Memorial Sloan-Kettering. Armored Brigade Physician (Major), IDF, project leader R&D branch, IDF.

Attending and Member, MSKCC. Co-Leader Lymphoma DMT, Chief- Radiation Hematology Service. Hodgkin and Non-Hodgkin NCCN guidelines committees.

Chairman of the International Lymphoma Radiation Oncology Group (www.ilrog.org)—over 1300 members in 75 countries.

Clinical Research focus on role of RT in salvage of lymphomas, breast cancer after chest RT, combined modality in PCNSL, RT for gastric MZL. Currently- clinical and biological aspects of sub-lethal radiation for lymphomas; role of RT to improve CAR-T cell therapy.

Translational research interest: Past- ATM mutations and risk of second cancers; autophagy as a mechanism for tumor cell death after radiation. Present- mechanisms and predictors of lethal effects of very low-dose RT on lymphoma cells and their environment.

Program Name(s)

Translational Research Program

Project Title

Impact of sublethal radiation dose on tumor response, microenvironment and the immune system

Weill Cornell Medicine

Dr. Wendy Béguelin is a basic and translational research scientist working in the field of lymphoma epigenetics. She obtained her degree of Biology at the University of Buenos Aires, Argentina, where she received extensive training in the investigation of cell biology and signal transduction with studies on epigenetic gene regulation and transcription factor binding. As a postdoctoral scientist at Weill Cornell Medical College, under the mentorship of Prof. Ari Melnick she has identified novel epigenetic and transcriptional mechanisms that contribute to B-cell differentiation and lymphomagenesis. She has studied the biological and transcriptional mechanisms of action of Polycomb proteins in germinal center B-cells and lymphomas derived from germinal centers. As Assistant Professor at Weill Cornell Medicine, Dr. Béguelin is committed to a career in basic/translational cancer research, bringing new ideas into the field of epigenetic control of lymphomagenesis and making discoveries that can be translated from the diagnostic and therapeutic standpoints.

Program Name(s)

Translational Research Program

Project Title

Discovery and therapeutic targeting of novel mechanisms driving Double Hit Lymphomas

The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center

Dr. Robert Orlowski, the Principal Investigator of this proposal, serves as the Florence Maude Thomas Cancer Research Professor and Director of the Myeloma Section at The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, and is the Deputy Chair of the Department of Lymphoma & Myeloma. Also, Dr. Orlowski serves as the Chair of the SWOG Barlogie/Salmon Myeloma Committee, which is part of the National Clinical Trials Network that conducts studies to advance novel therapies for myeloma, and to expand our understanding of its biology. In the laboratory arena, Dr. Orlowski is a physician scientist whose focus has been on bench-to-bedside research that develops and validates novel therapies to improve patient outcomes, and focuses on drug resistance mechanisms that may serve as predictive biomarkers for response. His past work has included leading roles in the development of the proteasome inhibitors bortezomib and carfilzomib, as well as the monoclonal antibodies daratumumab and elotuzumab.

Program Name(s)

Specialized Center of Research Program

Translational Research Program

Project Title

SCOR in High Risk Plasma Cell Dyscrasias

Targeting HSP70 to Immune Effector Cells to Overcome the Immune Suppressive Myeloma Microenvironment

Dana-Farber Cancer Institute

Kimberly Stegmaier, MD, Professor of Pediatrics at Harvard Medical School and the Ted Williams Chair at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, has advanced the application of genomics to drug and protein target discovery for leukemia. She is the Vice-Chair for Pediatric Oncology Research, Co-director of the Pediatric Hematologic Malignancy Program, a pediatric oncologist at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and Boston Children’s Hospital, and an Institute Member of the Broad Institute. She’s the recipient of the Joanne Levy, MD, Memorial Award for Outstanding Achievement from the American Society of Hematology, a SU2C Innovative Research Grant, the E. Mead Johnson Award for Research in Pediatrics, and an NCI Outstanding Investigator Award. She was elected to the American Society of Clinical Investigation and the Association of American Physicians. She received her undergraduate degree from Duke University where she graduated valedictorian, medical degree from Harvard Medical School, and trained in Pediatric Hematology/Oncology at Boston Children’s Hospital and Dana-Farber Cancer Institute.

Program Name(s)

Dare to Dream

Project Title

Advancing New Therapeutic Strategies for Pediatric Acute Leukemias

Beckman Research Institute of the City of Hope

Dr. Danilov earned his medical degree and PhD in Physiology in Russia. He is a physician-scientist with background in molecular biology and oncologic drug development and expertise in cancer cell signaling. He leads an independent research program in hematologic malignancies which bridges the understanding of B-cell biology with early clinical evaluation of novel therapeutics.

Program Name(s)

Career Development Program

Translational Research Program

Project Title

Overcoming ibrutinib resistance in mantle cell lymphoma

Enhancing efficacy of cyclin-dependent kinase inhibitors in diffuse large B-cell lymphoma

Dana-Farber Cancer Institute

Dr. Hantel is a faculty member in the Divisions of Population Sciences and Leukemia at DFCI and an Instructor in Medicine at Harvard Medical School. His research focuses on characterizing and remediating clinical trial enrollment disparities for patients with blood cancers, for which he has been awarded career development awards from the NCI (K08) and ASCO to develop and test related multilevel interventions. He also leads multicenter care delivery trials assessing social determinants of health and the impact of Duffy null phenotype on trial participation and outcomes. Work related to these projects has led to multiple publications in journals such as in JAMA, JCO, JNCI, and NEJM. He co-chairs the working group of the DFCI Clinical Trial Access Committee and serves as the Health Disparities and Leukemia Committee Liaison for the Alliance cooperative group. In his clinical role, he cares for patients with leukemia and related hematologic malignancies.

Program Name(s)

Equity in Access

Project Title

The Collaboration and Infrastructure Program for Diversifying Blood Cancer Clinical Trials

Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania

Dr. Liling Wan is an Assistant Professor at the University of Pennsylvania. She received a B.S. in Biological Sciences and Biotechnology from Tsinghua University and a Ph.D. in Molecular Biology from Princeton University. She conducted postdoctoral research at Rockefeller University where she studied chromatin regulators in cancer. The Wan lab studies basic gene regulatory mechanisms and how these mechanisms are dysregulated in cancer, with the goal of harnessing these insights for therapeutics. Her research has revealed how chromatin “reader” proteins impact gene regulation in cancer such as acute myeloid leukemia and led to early drug development efforts targeting these mechanisms. Dr. Wan has been recognized for her innovative and impactful research through numerous awards including AACR NextGen Star, NIH Pathway to Independence Award, the NIH Director’s New Innovator Award, and was recently named a Pew-Stewart Scholar, V Foundation Scholar, and ASH Scholar.

Program Name(s)

Career Development Program

Project Title

Epigenetic Mechanisms in Acute Myeloid Leukemia