The Triple Negative Breast Cancer Foundation-AACR NextGen Grant for Transformative Cancer Research represent the AACR’s flagship funding initiative to stimulate highly innovative research from young investigators. This grant mechanism is intended to promote and support creative, paradigm-shifting cancer research that may not be funded through conventional channels. It is expected that these grants will catalyze significant scientific discoveries and help talented young investigators gain scientific independence.

2024 Grantee

Research

Understanding the driver mutations behind basal-like breast cancer (BLBC) is crucial for developing molecular targeted therapies, as has been done for other breast cancer subtypes. While cancer genome projects have provided detailed characterizations of BLBC, the causal relationship between patient-derived genetic lesions and BLBC initiation and progression remains largely unclear. Dr. Ying and his team utilized a novel in-utero lentivirus injection-based murine in vivo screening system to identify top drivers from 229 genetic lesions enriched in human BLBCs. Surprisingly, these drivers were found to initiate BLBC through an autocrine program that mimics the mammary branching signals typically activated by puberty hormones—despite the hallmark hormone independence of BLBC. In the current project, they aim to uncover how this puberty-mimicking autocrine program is activated and whether inhibiting key signal hubs within this pathway can effectively suppress BLBC growth.

Biography

Dr. Ying earned his doctorate at Sun Yat-sen University, focusing on oncogenic signaling in squamous cell carcinoma and lung cancer. During his postdoctoral training at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center, he developed a rapid in vivo screening platform to identify breast cancer drivers and created advanced tools to study epithelial cell fate choice during cancer initiation. Dr. Ying is now an assistant Professor at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, where his team investigates epithelial cell fate choice in cancer and regeneration.

Acknowledgement of Support

“It is a great honor for our team to receive the 2024 Triple Negative Breast Cancer Research Foundation-AACR NextGen Grant for Transformative Cancer Research. This support is crucial for advancing our efforts to understand how key driver lesions of triple-negative breast cancer hijack the fundamental mechanisms of mammary gland development.”