Scientific Areas of Expertise: Metabolism; Stress Responses; Tumor Microenvironment
For enriching contributions to the understanding of cellular, tissue, and organismal responses to changes in oxygen availability, including the characterization of PU.1 as an essential component of hematopoietic cell development, and for defining how oxygen gradients may regulate hematopoiesis, angiogenesis, cardiovascular development, stem cell function, and tumor development via HIF-1 and other oxygen sensors.
An esteemed champion of cancer research, Dr. Simon has made eminent contributions to the understanding of cellular, tissue, and organismal responses to changes in oxygen availability, encompassing stem cell biology, physiology, immunology, and cancer. Through her exploration of the diverse effects of hypoxia in tumor progression, Dr. Simon has bridged basic and clinical research and translated fundamental biological principles into current therapies by elucidating how cells sense and respond to changes in the availability of molecular oxygen and nutrients. After defining the role of the PU.1 transcription factor as an essential component of hematopoietic cell development, she shifted her focus to oxygen gradients and their ability to regulate hematopoiesis, angiogenesis, cardiovascular development, stem cell function, and tumor development.
Earlier in her career, Dr. Simon’s seminal work in the field revealed that oxygen gradients exert their functions through hypoxia inducible factors (HIFs), later demonstrating that HIF-1alpha and HIF-2alpha exhibit nonredundant functions in multiple cancers. This finding provided a paramount molecular insight into how to selectively target each factor individually. Moreover, her more recent findings have demonstrated that oxygen availability also influences the behavior of multiple stem cell populations as well as the progression of multiple diseases, such as inflammation and solid tumors. Dr. Simon’s current work involves the utilization of both animal models and cancer patient samples and is focused on furthering our understanding of how oxygen sensing impacts tumor inflammation, metabolism, metastasis, and overall disease progression with the goal of developing novel and effective treatment strategies to combat hepatocellular carcinoma, pancreas cancer, renal cell carcinoma, and soft tissue sarcoma.
Selected Awards and Honors
2021 Elected Member, National Academy of Sciences, Washington, DC
2018 Elected Member, National Academy of Medicine, Washington, DC
2017 Outstanding Investigator Award, National Cancer Institute, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, Maryland
2016 Excellence in Teaching Award, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
2014 Elected Fellow, American Academy of Arts and Sciences, Cambridge, Massachusetts
2014 Board of Directors, American Association for Cancer Research, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
2007 Stanley N. Cohen Award for Biomedical Research, University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
2003 Woman of the Year, Ursuline Academy, Cincinnati, Ohio
1994-2014 HHMI Investigator, Howard Hughes Medical Institute, Chevy Chase, Maryland
1999 Elliot Osserman Award, Israel Cancer Research Fund, New York, New York
1993 Young Investigator Award, American Cancer Foundation, Atlanta, Georgia