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NextGen Stars

The NextGen Stars program provides an exciting opportunity to increase the visibility of early-career scientists at the AACR Annual Meeting and to support the professional development and advancement of those selected as AACR NextGen Stars.

CONGRATULATIONS TO THE 2022 NEXTGEN STARS!

Mustapha Abubakar, MD, PhD

Mustapha Abubakar, MD, PhD

Research Fellow, Division of Cancer Epidemiology and Genetics

National Cancer Institute, Rockville, Maryland

Double-edged “soil”: Stromal microenvironment in breast cancer

Major Symposium SY25

Metabolic and Nutritional Regulation of Cancer and Immunity

Tuesday, April 12, 2022

Ana Luisa Correia, PhD

Ana Luisa Correia, PhD

Principal Investigator, Cancer Dormancy and Immunity Lab

Champalimaud Foundation, Lisbon, Portugal

Revisiting NK cell immunity to prevent metastasis 

Major Symposium SY31

Tumor Dormancy

Sunday, April 10, 2022

Isra Elhussin, MBBS, MSc

Isra Elhussin, MBBS, MSc

Tuskegee University, Tuskegee, Alabama

Prostate cancer: Multi-omics comparison between European, African American, and Native African men with prostate cancer  

Advances in Organ Site Research AOS08

The Next Generation of Targets for Prostate Cancer

Monday, April 11, 2022

Ekrem Emrah Er, PhD

Ekrem Emrah Er, PhD

Assistant Professor, Department of Physiology and Biophysics

University of Illinois at Chicago, Chicago, IL

Elevated cellular stiffness sensitizes metastatic cells to destruction by mechanosurveillance: The mechanical mode of immune surveillance  

Major Symposium SY23

Extracellular Matrix Remodeling in Cancer

Tuesday, April 12, 2022

Ariella Hanker, PhD

Ariella Hanker, PhD

Assistant Professor, Simmons Comprehensive Cancer Center

The University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, Dallas, Texas

It takes two: Cooperating oncogenic mutations in the HER2/HER3 pathway  

Advances in Organ Site Research AOS02

Triple Negative Breast Cancer: Molecular Insights and Treatment Advances

Monday, April 11, 2022

Daniel Herranz, PharmD, PhD

Daniel Herranz, PharmD, PhD

Assistant Professor of Pharmacology

Rutgers Cancer Institute, New Brunswick, New Jersey

Identification of SIRT1 as a novel therapeutic target in T-ALL  

Major Symposium SY04

Epigenetic Alterations as Cancer Therapeutic Targets

Monday, April 11, 2022

Sarah J. Hill, MD, PhD

Sarah J. Hill, MD, PhD

Assistant Professor, Medical Oncology/Molecular and Cellular Oncology

Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, Boston, Massachusetts

Dissecting mechanisms of NK cell dysfunction and re-engagement in high grade serous ovarian cancer  

Advances in Organ Site Research AOS10

Advances in Ovarian Cancer Screening and Treatment

Monday, April 11, 2022

William L. Hwang, MD, PhD

William L. Hwang, MD, PhD

Radiation Oncologist and Research Fellow

Massachusetts General Hospital Cancer Center/Harvard Medical School, Boston, Massachusetts

Multicellular spatial community featuring a novel neuronal-like malignant phenotype is enriched in pancreatic cancer after neoadjuvant chemotherapy and radiotherapy  

Major Symposium SY12

Nerves, Cancer, and Immunity

Monday, April 11, 2022

Anand G. Patel, MD, PhD

Anand G. Patel, MD, PhD

Instructor, Department of Oncology

St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital, Memphis, Tennessee

The myogenesis program drives clonal selection and drug resistance in pediatric rhabdomyosarcoma

Advances in Organ Site Research AOS09

Models for Rare Cancers

Tuesday, April 12, 2022

Arja Ray, PhD

Arja Ray, PhD

Postdoctoral Fellow, Department of Pathology

University of California San Francisco, San Francisco, California

Next-generation macrophage and T cell activation reporters to define functional immune states in solid tumors  

Major Symposium SY19

Myeloid Cell Control of Therapeutic Antitumor Immunity

Tuesday, April 12, 2022

Marcus Ruscetti, PhD

Marcus Ruscetti, PhD

Assistant Professor, Department of Molecular Cell and Cancer Biology

University of Massachusetts Chan Medical School, Worcester, Massachusetts  

Modulating cellular senescence to reinstate natural killer cell immunity for pancreatic cancer immunotherapy  

Major Symposium SY24

Aging and the Tumor Microenvironment’s Impact on Minimal Residual Disease and Cancer Recurrence

Wednesday, April 13, 2022

Ayesha Shafi, PhD

Ayesha Shafi, PhD

Assistant Professor, Center for Prostate Disease Research

Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences/The Henry M. Jackson Foundation for the Advancement of Military Medicine, Bethesda, Maryland

The circadian cryptochrome, CRY1, is a pro-tumorigenic factor that rhythmically modulates DNA repair  

Presidential Select Symposium SY33

Aging, Stress, and Cancer

Monday, April 11, 2022

Katherine Tossas, PhD, MS

Katherine Tossas, PhD, MS

Assistant Professor, Department of Health Behavior & Policy

Massey Cancer Center, Virginia Commonwealth University, Richmond, Virginia

The vaginal microbiome may operate differently by race to precipitate the risk of pre-cervical cancer  

Advances in Population Sciences APS01

Where You Live Matters: From Biological to Social Determinants of Cancer Outcomes

Tuesday, April 12, 2022

Derek Wainwright, PhD

Derek Wainwright, PhD

Assistant Professor, Departments of Neurological Surgery, Medicine, and Immunology

Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, Chicago, Illinois

IDO: Going beyond enzyme activity to eradicate glioblastoma  

Advances in Organ Site Research AOS13

Advances in Glioblastoma Cancer Research and Cancer Care

Monday, April 11, 2022

View the abstracts of the NextGen Stars’ presentations from the AACR Annual Meeting 2021:

Andrew Aguirre, MD, PhD

Andrew Aguirre, MD, PhD

Physician and Assistant Professor of Medicine

Harvard Medical School, Boston, Massachusetts

Synthetic lethal interaction between the ESCRT paralog enzymes VPS4A and VPS4B in cancers harboring loss of chromosome 18q or 16q

Moran Amit, MD, PhD

Moran Amit, MD, PhD

Assistant Professor, Department of Head and Neck Surgery

The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, Texas

Cancer takes a nerve: Loss of p53 drives neuron reprogramming in head and neck cancer

Xuhui Bao, MD, PhD

Xuhui Bao, MD, PhD

Postdoctoral Associate, Department of Dermatology

Duke University Medical Center, Durham, North Carolina

From cholesterol regulation to tumor suppression: Pcsk9 as a novel target for cancer immunotherapy

Shruti Bhatt, PhD

Shruti Bhatt, PhD

Assistant Professor, Department of Pharmacy

National University of Singapore, Singapore

Reduction in mitochondrial priming drives resistance to targeted therapy in acute myeloid leukemia

George M. Burslem, PhD

George M. Burslem, PhD

Assistant Professor, Department of Biochemistry and Biophysics

Perelman School of Medicine of the University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

Addressing scaffolding roles of oncogenic kinases with targeted protein degradation

Pau Castel, PhD

Pau Castel, PhD

Postdoctoral Scholar, HDF Comprehensive Cancer Center

University of California, San Francisco, San Francisco, California

Oncoprotein duality in cancer and developmental syndromes: Lessons learned from RAS GTPases

Burcu Darst, PhD

Burcu Darst, PhD

Postdoctoral Fellow, Department of Preventive Medicine

Keck School of Medicine of the University of Southern California, Los Angeles, California

Multiethnic prostate cancer GWAS meta-analysis identifies novel variants, improves genetic risk prediction across populations, and informs biological mechanisms of prostate cancer

Christy R. Hagan, PhD

Christy R. Hagan, PhD

Assistant Professor, Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology

University of Kansas Medical Center, Kansas City, Kansas

Progesterone-mediated immune evasion in breast cancer

Xin Jin, PhD

Xin Jin, PhD

Scientist/Group Lead

Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard, Cambridge, Massachusetts

A metastasis map of human cancer cell lines

Anusha Kalbasi, MD

Anusha Kalbasi, MD

Assistant Professor, Department of Radiation and Oncology

David Geffen School of Medicine, University of California Los Angeles, Los Angeles, California

Orthogonal IL-9 receptor signaling reprograms T cells to obviate conditioning chemotherapy before adoptive cell therapy

Yuxuan Phoenix Miao, PhD

Yuxuan Phoenix Miao, PhD

Assistant Professor, Ben May Department of Cancer Research

The University of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois

Decoding the stem cells-immune cell dialogues for cancer immunotherapy

Zeribe Chike Nwosu, PhD

Zeribe Chike Nwosu, PhD

Postdoctoral Research Fellow, Department of Molecular and Integrative Physiology

Rogel Cancer Center, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Michigan

Identification of high priority genes for basic and translational pancreatic cancer research

Sara Pedron, PhD

Sara Pedron, PhD

Assistant Professor, Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering

University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, Illinois

Bioengineered tissue mimetic hydrogels to study brain tumor biology and screen therapeutics

Luis Alberto Perez-Quintero, MD, PhD

Luis Alberto Perez-Quintero, MD, PhD

Postdoctoral Fellow, Department of Biochemistry

Goodman Cancer Research Centre, McGill University, Montréal, Québec, Canada

BatF3 commands enhanced anti-tumoral effector functions of CD8 T cells with reduced PTPN1/PTPN2 activity

Debattama Sen, PhD

Debattama Sen, PhD

Member of the Faculty, Center for Cancer Research

Massachusetts General Hospital Cancer Center, Harvard Medical School

Disrupting enhancers within the core epigenetic program of exhaustion improves CD8+ T cell responses and enhances tumor control

Eneda Toska, PhD

Eneda Toska, PhD

Assistant Professor, Department of Oncology

Sidney Kimmel Cancer Center, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, Maryland

Epigenetic mechanisms of endocrine therapy response in breast cancer