Dear Friend of the Englander Institute for Precision Medicine,
Welcome to our fourth 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 the end of September. 
It was a pleasure to recently host the new Weill Cornell Medicine Dean Robert Harrington for a briefing by myself, and Drs. Cora Sternberg, Bishoy Faltas, Andrea Sboner, Johnathan Zippin and Benjamin D. Hopkins. Our group later toured labs and met with colleagues Hiranmayi Ravichandran, Ilkay Us, Cynthia Cheung and Jeffrey Catalano. 
I invite you to check out our new Englander Institute for Precision Medicine website! The new site brings a lot more flexibility for presenting content, has improved navigation, and brings us in-line with WCM ITS best practices for new websites.
It's been a remarkably productive quarter and year, with new awards & grants to researchers, new clinical trials initiated, news media coverage of our colleagues, exciting events, and published research in top-tier scientific journals. A sample of this work is highlighted below.
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. We invite you to consider donating to our mission to advance science and speed new treatments to patients. Thanks in advance for your support.
And we thank you again for your interest in our work!
Sincerely,
Olivier Elemento, Ph.D.
EIPM Director
News Coverage & Awards 
Congratulations to Dr. Lorenzo Galluzzi on earning a $3.5M grant on October 10th from the National Cancer Institute for a study entitled “Targeting the BCL2 immune checkpoint to enhance the immunostimulatory effects of radiation in breast cancer.” Dr. Lorenzo Galluzzi and I were also named 2023 Clarivate Highly Cited Researchers. According to Clarivate, "Highly Cited Researchers have demonstrated significant and broad influence in their field(s) of research. Of the world’s population of scientists and social scientists, Highly Cited Researchers are 1 in 1,000."
Our Scientific Director Dr. Massimo Cristofanilli was awarded a $2.3M U.S. Department of Defense Breast Cancer Research Program Breakthrough Award for his project “Early Detection Blood Test for Universal Breast Cancer Screening to Improve Early Diagnosis for Women of All Social and Ethnic Backgrounds.” Additionally, Dr. Cristofanilli was interviewed by Spectrum News on October 25th regarding his work with liquid biopsy to detect and treat breast cancer as early as possible.
Congratulations to our Director of Bladder Cancer Research Dr. Bishoy Faltas on being awarded a $4 million, seven-year MERIT grant from the National Cancer Institute! Dr. Faltas also earned the 2023 Society for Basic Urologic Research Young Investigator Award given to SBUR members under the age of 45 who "have made significant contributions to Urologic Research," and a $610,000 grant from the U.S. Department of Defense to study the mechanisms that drive the spread of bladder cancer. Additionally, Dr. Bishoy Faltas guest edited the Urologic Oncology Special Issue on advances in UC treatments on October 11th.
Congratulations to our colleague Dr. Lisa Newman, chief of the section of breast surgery, and Dr. Jedd Wolchok, Director of the Meyer Cancer Center, on their October 9th election into the National Academy of Medicine. Dr. Newman made Breast Cancer Awareness Month news for her work promoting the Shoes for a Cure charity shoe sale, which raised $600,000 for breast cancer research. Dr. Newman was also interviewed for the News 12 broadcast segment "Turn To Tara team investigates racial disparities in breast cancer outcomes," on October 25th. 
Congratulations to our former colleague Dr. Tomer Yaron who was selected to the 2024 Forbes "30 Under 30" list! Dr. Yaron was co-advised by myself and Dr. Lew Cantley while completing his Ph.D. here.
Dr. Howard Fine was interviewed for the article "Do I Need to Worry About Smartphone Radiation? Some studies have linked cellphone use with cancer, so we asked some experts to explain the risk," which appeared in The New York Times on November 14th.
It was an honor to participate on the "Spoken Word" panel at the Milken Institute's "2023 Future of Health Summit" in Washington, D.C. on November 6th exploring voice biomarkers to detect changes in our health. I was also interviewed on the same topic by STAT News for the article "Experts talk detecting disease from voice biomarkers with AI, privacy concerns," which ran on November 7th. 
Congratulations to Dr. Margaret (Betsy) Ross who received a $3.5M grant from the National Institute of Child Health & Human Development for a study entitled “Understanding Genetic Complexity in Spina Bifida.”
Congratulations to Associate Director for Precision Immunology Laura Santambrogio on earning an NIH R01 grant as co-Investigator with PI: Theresa Lu to study "Understanding the Biological Mechanisms of Lupus Disease."
A recent Oncogene paper by our Director of Liquid Biopsy Research Dr. Pashtoon Kasi, "Neoadjuvant botensilimab plus balstilimab response pattern in locally advanced mismatch repair proficient colorectal cancer," has been accessed more than 10,000 times, making it one of the most popular Oncogene papers of the year!
EIPM researchers Drs. Pashtoon Kasi, Manish Shah, Nasser Altorki, Vivek Mittal, and Niroshana Anandasabapathy were interviewed for the article "Cancer Vaccines' Promise: The quest for cancer vaccines is finally turning a corner, accelerated by strides in immunotherapy and Covid vaccine technology," that appeared in the Weill Cornell Medicine fall 2023 magazine Impact.
Events
Thanks to everyone who made our 20th International Cancer Genome Consortium Scientific Workshop held on November 07-09 such a great success! The event focused on promoting the diversity of genomic data and overcoming obstacles to sharing large cohorts. It was truly an international event with participation by over 100 members from 10 countries!
WCM and NYP experts including Dr. Chris Barbieri participated in the WCM Urology webinar, "Prostate Cancer: Understanding Causes, Diagnosis and Treatments," on November 16th.
Clinical Director Dr. Cora Sternberg participated in UroToday's new educational Masterclass program, "New Pathways for Treating Metastatic Castration-Resistant Prostate Cancer," on November 8th. Dr. Sternberg also spoke with UroToday for the November 13th news story "The EV-302 Study and the Implications for Metastatic Bladder Cancer Care."
Dr. Iman Hajirasouliha presented "Weakly-Supervised Tumor Purity Predictions from Frozen H&E Stained Slides," at AMP2023 on November 18th.
Dr. Scott T. Tagawa participated in the "CURE Webinar on Diversity, Equity and Inclusion in Prostate Cancer," on November 17th. 
The EIPM Molecular Aging Institute's Clinical Director Dr. Pinkal Desai presented two talks at the 65th Annual Meeting of the American Society of Hematology, "Achieving ''Next-Level'' Care in AML: Conversations on Targeted Platforms, Emerging Immunotherapies, and "Implications for Precision Medicine," and Molecular and Cytogenetic Characteristics of Acute Myeloid Leukemia (AML) and Myelodysplastic Syndrome (MDS) in Patients Exposed to Chemotherapy (CT) and/or Radiation (XRT)."
Bioinformatics analyst Kathryn Gorski presented "An event-driven solution to integrate pipeline executions within complex informatics infrastructures," at the Nextflow SUMMIT 2023 on November 30th in Boston.
Publications
"Pan-Cancer Prevalence of Microsatellite Instability-High (MSI-H) Identified by Circulating Tumor DNA and Associated Real-World Clinical Outcomes. The data support use of a well-validated ctDNA assay to detect MSI-H across solid tumors and suggest prolonged PFS in patients treated with IO-containing regimens after detection. Tumor-agnostic, ctDNA-based MSI testing may be reliable for rapid decision making," was published by Dr. Pashtoon Kasi and colleagues in JCO Precision Oncology on November 7th. Dr. Kasialso published the Frontiers in Oncology editorial, "Case reports in gastrointestinal cancers : 2022," on November 16th. 
"Prostate-Specific Membrane Antigen–Targeting Alpha Emitter via Antibody Delivery for Metastatic Castration-Resistant Prostate Cancer: A Phase I Dose-Escalation Study of 225Ac-J591," was published in the Journal of Clinical Oncology by Dr. Scott T. Tagawa with Drs. Cora N. Sternberg, Ana Molina, Karla Ballman, and David M. Nanus on November 3rd. 
"Plasma metabolomics profiling of 580 patients from an Early Detection Research Network prostate cancer cohort," was published by Dr. Massimo Loda from the Pathology and Laboratory Medicine Department and EIPM's Dr. Jan Krumsiek, with our colleagues Drs. Elisa Benedetti, Kelsey Chetnik, and Christopher E. Barbieri in Scientific Data on November 25th. 
"Transcriptomic signatures of chronic active antibody-mediated rejection deciphered by RNA sequencing of human kidney allografts," was published on November 29th in Kidney International by myself and colleagues from the WCM Departments of Medicine and Pathology and Laboratory Medicine. 
"Avelumab first-line maintenance treatment for advanced urothelial carcinoma: review of evidence to guide clinical practice. Overall, level 1 evidence from the JAVELIN Bladder 100 trial, long-term follow-up data, and emerging ‘real-word’ data, support the use of avelumab first-line maintenance as the standard of care in patients with advanced UC that has not progressed with first-line platinum-based chemotherapy," was published in ESMO Open by Clinical Director Dr. Cora N. Sternberg and colleagues, December 2023.
"Molecular determinants of the crosstalk between endosomal microautophagy and chaperone-mediated autophagy," was published in Cell Reports on December 5th by our Associate Director for Precision Immunology Dr. Laura Santambrogio.
"False-Positive Liquid Biopsy Assays Secondary to Overlapping Aberrant Methylation from Non-Cancer Disease States," was published in Case Reports in Oncology on December 5th by our Director for Liquid Biopsy Research Dr. Pashtoon Kasi.
"NIPBL::NACC1 Fusion Hepatic Carcinoma," was published in The American Journal of Surgical Pathology on December 4th by Drs. Erika Hissong, Majd Al Assaad, Alissa Semaan, MS, Dr. Christine Orr, Jyothi Manohar, MPH, Michael Sigouros, BS, David Wilkes, PhD, Andrea Sboner, PhD, Olivier Elemento, PhD, José Jessurun, MD; and Juan Miguel Mosquera, MD from the Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine and the EIPM. 
"Circulating tumor DNA enables sensitive detection of actionable gene fusions and rearrangements across cancer types," was published in Clinical Cancer Research on December 7th by Dr. Pashtoon Kasi and colleagues. 
"Co-occurring BRCA2/SPOP Mutations Predict Exceptional Poly (ADP-ribose) Polymerase Inhibitor Sensitivity in Metastatic Castration-Resistant Prostate Cancer," was published in European Urology Oncology on December 9th by Clinical Director Dr. Cora N. Sternberg and Panagiotis J. Vlachostergios.
"Neoadjuvant durvalumab plus radiation versus durvalumab alone in stages I-III non-small cell lung cancer: survival outcomes and molecular correlates of a randomized phase II trial," was published in Nature Communications on December 19th by Dr. Nasser K. Altorki, with EIPM colleagues Drs. Ashish Saxena, Bhavneet Bhinder, Vivek Mittal, Sylvia C. Formenti and Olivier Elemento. 
"Multiscale protein networks systematically identify aberrant protein interactions and oncogenic regulators in seven cancer types," was published in the Journal of Hematology & Oncology on December 15th by Dr. Benjamin Hopkins with Dr. Richard Farias.
"Bacterial antigens unleash tumor-targeting immunity," was published in Cell Host & Microbe on December 13th by Dr. Lorenzo Galluzzi and colleagues. 
"Epinephrine inhibits PI3Kα via the Hippo kinases," was published in Cell Reports on December 26th by our colleagues Drs. Tomer M. Yaron, Emily M. Huntsman, and Benjamin D. Hopkins. 
"NAK-associated protein 1/NAP1 activates TBK1 to ensure accurate mitosis and cytokinesis," was published in The Journal of Cell Biology on December 7th by Drs. Tomer M. Yaron and Emily M. Huntsman.
"A reversible epigenetic memory of inflammatory injury controls lineage plasticity and tumor initiation in the mouse pancreas," was published in Developmental Cell on December 5th by Drs. Andre F. Rendeiro, Doron Betel, and Olivier Elemento. 
"Cellular residual disease (CRD) in early breast cancer –Expanding the concept of minimal residual disease monitoring?," was published in The Journal of Liquid Biopsy on December 15th by Scientific Director Dr. Massimo Cristofanilli and colleagues.
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