Scientific Advisory Board

Expertise
Epigenetics of stem cell differentiation; retinoid pharmacology; head and neck squamous cell carcinoma; mitochondrial function in kidney cancer

Current Reseach Interest
The molecular regulation of the differentiation of embryonic stem cells. The molecular mechanisms of action of retinoids (vitamin A and related molecules) in the regulation of cell differentiation and the inhibition of neoplastic transformation. Analysis of retinoid metabolism and signaling in normal and tumor cells. Delineation of the role of the enzyme LRAT (lecithin:retinol acyltransferase) in vitamin A (retinol) uptake and storage, and characterization of the mechanism by which LRAT expression is lost in human tumor cells. The functional analysis of the transcription factor Rex1 (Zfp42), a marker of embryonic stem cells. Development of new mouse models for kidney cancer and head and neck cancer. Understanding how vitamin A deficiency in mice causes hyperglycemia and loss of pancreatic beta cell mass. Development of new drugs for diabetes and fatty liver disease.

Select Publications

1. Quintero CM, Laursen KB, Mongan NP, Luo M, and Gudas LJ. (2018) CARM1 (PRMT4) acts as a transcriptional coactivator during retinoic acid-induced embryonic stem cell differentiation. J Mol Biol. In press. PMID: 30153436
2. Trasino SE, Tang XH, Shevchuk MM, Choi ME, and Gudas LJ. (2018) Amelioration of diabetic nephropathy using a retinoic acid receptor β2 agonist. J Pharmacol Exp Ther. 367(1):82-94. PMID: 30054312. PMC6123666.
3. Sureshbabu A, Patino E, Ma K, Laursen K, Finkelsztein E, Akchurin O, Thangamini M, Ryter SW, Gudas LJ, Choi, AMK, Choi ME. (2018) RIPK3 promotes sepsis-induced acute kidney injury via mitochondrial dysfunction. JCI Insight. 3(11):98411. PMID: 29875323. PMC6124406.
4. Trasino SE, Tang XH, Jessurun J, and Gudas LJ. (2016) A retinoic acid receptor β2 agonist reduces hepatic stellate cell activation in nonalcoholic fatty liver disease. J Mol Med. 94(10):1143-51. PMID: 27271256. PMC5053866.

Icahn Scholar
Ward Coleman Professor in Cancer Research
Director, Tisch Cancer Institute at Mount Sinai
Director, Mount Sinai Cancer, Mount Sinai Health System
Chairman of the Department of Oncological Sciences at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai

Ramon Parsons received his education at Columbia University (A.B., 1983), State University of New York at Stony Brook (M.D.-Ph.D., 1984-1992), and Johns Hopkins University (postdoctoral fellowship, 1992-1995). Dr. Parsons joined the faculty of the Departments of Pathology and Medicine at Columbia University as an Assistant Professor in 1995 and was promoted to the the Avon Foundation Chair for Breast Cancer Research in 2002, Professor in 2007, and Leader of its Breast Cancer Program Herbert Irving Comprehensive Cancer Center in 2005. In 2013 he transitioned to Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai to Chair the Department of Oncological Sciences where he is an Icahn Scholar and the Ward-Coleman Professor in Cancer Research. In 2017, he was appointed Director of the NCI-designated Tisch Cancer Institute at Mount Sinai and the Director of Mount Sinai Cancer for the Mount Sinai Health System after serving as the co-Leader of the Cancer Mechanisms program and the Deputy Director. Dr. Parsons maintains an active laboratory and has received multiple awards for his research, including the 2011 AACR Outstanding Investigator Award for Breast Cancer Research and is a member of the American Society for Clinical Investigation, the American College of Physicians, and the National Academy of Medicine. He was the Chair of the AACR Special conferences committee for two terms from 2011-2017, which initiated and planned over 75 scientific meetings on different cancer related topics.

Dr. Parsons is internationally recognized as an expert in the fields of cancer genetics and signal transduction. Dr. Parsons’ graduate work established the molecular mechanism through which Large T Antigen unwinds the SV40 virus core origin of replication (Parsons et al. J. Virology 1988, 1989, 1990). His postdoctoral fellowship established the role of defective DNA mismatch repair in the development of colon cancer and a genetic test for detecting mutation burden (Parsons et al. Cell 1993; Parsons et al. Science 1995; Parsons et al. Cancer Research 1995; Liu et al. Nature Medicine 1995). In 1997 after establishing his own laboratory, he discovered the tumor suppressor located on chromosome 10q23, named it Phosphatase and Tensin Homolog on Chromosome Ten (PTEN), and showed that PTEN is mutated in a wide variety of cancers and inherited cancer predisposition syndromes (Li et al., Science 1997; Liaw et al., Nature Genetics 1997). He then demonstrated that restoring wild type PTEN expression in mutant PTEN tumor cell lines inhibited phosphoinositide 3’-kinase (PI3K) signaling to induce cell death that could be rescued by activated AKT (Li et al., Cancer Research 1998). He showed that

Martin S. Tallman, M.D. is Chief, Leukemia Service at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center and Professor of Medicine at Weill Cornell Medical College in New York, USA. He is a diplomate of the American Board of Internal Medicine with sub-specialty certification in the areas of hematology and medical oncology.

He served as Chair of the Leukemia Committee of the Eastern Cooperative Oncology Group for 16 years. Dr. Tallman received his bachelor’s degree in Science at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, Michigan, USA and his medical degree at The Chicago Medical School in Chicago, Illinois, USA. After completing an internship, residencies, and chief residency at McGraw Medical Center at Northwestern University, Dr. Tallman completed his fellowship in hematology/oncology at the University of Washington and the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center in Seattle, Washington, USA. Dr. Tallman is a member of numerous committees of national, regional, and international professional societies involved in the study and treatment of cancer, including the American Society of Hematology, American Society of Clinical Oncology, and the Eastern Cooperative Oncology Group. He currently serves as Co-Chair of the Acute Myeloid Leukemia Panel of the National Comprehensive Cancer Network (NCCN). Dr. Tallman has contributed a large body of work to the literature addressing the diagnosis, biology, and treatment of acute leukemia and other hematologic malignancies. This work includes original research articles in peer-reviewed journals, textbook chapters and reviews, monographs, editorials, and abstracts. He has spoken as an invited lecturer and chair at many national and international symposia, conferences, and meetings, including the American Society of Hematology Meeting, the American Society of Clinical Oncology Meeting, and the CIBMTR Tandem Annual Meeting. Dr. Tallman completed two terms as an Associate Editor of Blood. He is a reviewer for many professional publications, including American Journal of Hematology, Annuals of Internal Medicine, Bone Marrow Transplantation, Cancer Research, Journal of Clinical Oncology, and New England Journal of Medicine. He also serves as the Editor-in-Chief of Clinical Haematology: Best Practice and Research.

Dr. Hua Yu is Billy Wilder Endowed Professor, Co-Leader of Cancer Immunotherapeutics Program, City of Hope Comprehensive Cancer Center and Associate Department Chair of Immuno-Oncology. Dr. Yu is a noted expert and pioneer on the cancer-promoting protein STAT3 and was the first to uncover and define the protein’s effect on the immune system. Dr. Yu’s studies have laid the foundation for a new generation of molecular targeted cancer therapy approaches that disable both tumor cells and the tumor stromal cells, which are critical for tumor growth. She has developed potentially paradigm-shifting novel siRNA and antibody delivery technology platforms to inhibit STAT3 and other challenging targets.

Dr. Yu received her bachelor’s and doctoral degrees from Columbia University in NYC. She completed fellowships with the American Cancer Society and the National Institutes of Health. The fundamental discoveries from her laboratory have been well supported continuously by grants from the National Institutes of Health. Her recent studies have been published extensively in such prestigious biomedical/cancer research journals as Nature Medicine, Cancer Cell, Nature Biotechnology, Immunity, Cancer Metabolism and Nature Reviews Cancer and Nature Reviews Immunology.