Mary L. Disis

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Disis at the Cancer Vaccine Institute laboratory at the University of Washington Dr. Mary (Nora) Disis.jpg
Disis at the Cancer Vaccine Institute laboratory at the University of Washington

Mary L. "Nora" Disis is an American physician-oncologist and the editor in chief of JAMA Oncology .

Contents

She was part of the scientific team who discovered that the HER2/neu molecule is a tumor-specific marker, or antigen.

Career

Disis is an oncologist [1] and the director of the University of Washington's Cancer Vaccine Institute, Center for Translational Medicine in Women's Health and its Institute of Translational Health Science. [2]

She is the associate dean of the University of Washington's School of Medicine, the dean of Research and Graduate Education, the associate dean of Translational Science, the Helen B. Slonaker Endowed Professor for Cancer Research, a professor of Medicine and Oncology, and an adjunct professor of Obstetrics & Gynecology and Pathology. [2]

She is an investigator at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center [3] and an expert in immunology and the immunotherapy of both ovarian and breast cancers. [4] She was part of the investigative team who discovered that the HER2/neu molecule is a tumor-specific marker, or antigen. [4] [5]

She is the founding editor in chief of JAMA Oncology . [2]

Selected publications

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Natural killer cell</span> Type of cytotoxic lymphocyte

Natural killer cells, also known as NK cells or large granular lymphocytes (LGL), are a type of cytotoxic lymphocyte critical to the innate immune system. They belong to the rapidly expanding family of known innate lymphoid cells (ILC) and represent 5–20% of all circulating lymphocytes in humans. The role of NK cells is analogous to that of cytotoxic T cells in the vertebrate adaptive immune response. NK cells provide rapid responses to virus-infected cells, stressed cells, tumor cells, and other intracellular pathogens based on signals from several activating and inhibitory receptors. Most immune cells detect the antigen presented on major histocompatibility complex I (MHC-I) on infected cell surfaces, but NK cells can recognize and kill stressed cells in the absence of antibodies and MHC, allowing for a much faster immune reaction. They were named "natural killers" because of the notion that they do not require activation to kill cells that are missing "self" markers of MHC class I. This role is especially important because harmful cells that are missing MHC I markers cannot be detected and destroyed by other immune cells, such as T lymphocyte cells.

A cancer vaccine, or oncovaccine, is a vaccine that either treats existing cancer or prevents development of cancer. Vaccines that treat existing cancer are known as therapeutic cancer vaccines or tumor antigen vaccines. Some of the vaccines are "autologous", being prepared from samples taken from the patient, and are specific to that patient.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Immunohistochemistry</span> Common application of immunostaining

Immunohistochemistry (IHC) is a form of immunostaining. It involves the process of selectively identifying antigens (proteins) in cells and tissue, by exploiting the principle of antibodies binding specifically to antigens in biological tissues. Albert Hewett Coons, Ernest Berliner, Norman Jones and Hugh J Creech was the first to develop immunofluorescence in 1941. This led to the later development of immunohistochemistry.

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cancer immunotherapy</span> Artificial stimulation of the immune system to treat cancer

Cancer immunotherapy (immuno-oncotherapy) is the stimulation of the immune system to treat cancer, improving the immune system's natural ability to fight the disease. It is an application of the fundamental research of cancer immunology (immuno-oncology) and a growing subspecialty of oncology.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">HER2</span> Mammalian protein found in humans

Receptor tyrosine-protein kinase erbB-2 is a protein that normally resides in the membranes of cells and is encoded by the ERBB2 gene. ERBB is abbreviated from erythroblastic oncogene B, a gene originally isolated from the avian genome. The human protein is also frequently referred to as HER2 or CD340.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Lapatinib</span> Cancer medication

Lapatinib (INN), used in the form of lapatinib ditosylate (USAN) is an orally active drug for breast cancer and other solid tumours. It is a dual tyrosine kinase inhibitor which interrupts the HER2/neu and epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) pathways. It is used in combination therapy for HER2-positive breast cancer. It is used for the treatment of patients with advanced or metastatic breast cancer whose tumors overexpress HER2 (ErbB2).

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A bispecific monoclonal antibody is an artificial protein that can simultaneously bind to two different types of antigen or two different epitopes on the same antigen. Naturally occurring antibodies typically only target one antigen. BsAbs can be manufactured in several structural formats. BsAbs can be designed to recruit and activate immune cells, to interfere with receptor signaling and inactivate signaling ligands, and to force association of protein complexes. BsAbs have been explored for cancer immunotherapy, drug delivery, and Alzheimer's disease.

An oncoantigen is a surface or soluble tumor antigen that supports tumor growth. A major problem of cancer immunotherapy is the selection of tumor cell variants that escape immune recognition. The notion of oncoantigen was set forth in the context of cancer immunoprevention to define a class of persistent tumor antigens not prone to escape from immune recognition.

Wafik El-Deiry is an American physician and cancer researcher who is the Associate Dean for Oncologic Sciences at the Warren Alpert Medical School, Brown University, Director of the Cancer Center at Brown University, and the Director of the Joint Program in Cancer Biology at Brown University and its affiliated hospitals. He was previously deputy director of Translational Research at Fox Chase Cancer Center, where he was also co-Leader of the Molecular Therapeutics Program.

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Neuvenge, Lapuleucel-T, is a therapeutic cancer vaccine (TCV) in development by Dendreon (DNDN). It uses the "immunotherapy platform approach" first successfully demonstrated on the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA)-approved TCV Provenge. It was first tested on breast cancer patients with tumors expressing HER2/neu, and is now scheduled to be tested on bladder cancer patients.

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Elizabeth Jaffee</span> American oncologist

Elizabeth M. Jaffee is an American oncologist specializing in pancreatic cancer and immunotherapy.

Robert Maki is an American medical oncologist, Professor of Medicine at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, He is a specialist in the management of and translational research regarding sarcoma, the group of connective tissue malignancies that include leiomyosarcoma, gastrointestinal stromal tumor (GIST), liposarcoma, angiosarcoma, Ewing sarcoma, desmoid tumor and many others.

Miram Merad is a French-Algerian professor in Cancer immunology and the Director of the Marc and Jennifer Lipschultz Precision Immunology Institute (PrIISM) at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai (ISMMS) in New York, NY. She is the corecipient of the 2018 William B. Coley Award for Distinguished Research in Basic Immunology and a member of the United States National Academy of Sciences and the National Academy of Medicine.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Uğur Şahin</span> German oncologist and immunologist (born 1965)

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">George Coukos</span> Tumor immunologist

George Coukos is a physician-scientist in tumor immunology, professor and director of the Ludwig Cancer Research Lausanne Branch and director of the Department of oncology UNIL-CHUV of the University of Lausanne and the Lausanne University Hospital in Lausanne, Switzerland. He is known for his work on the mechanisms by which tumors suppress anti-cancer immune responses, and the role of the tumor vasculature in that suppression. In addition to his work in ovarian cancer, the combinatorial immune therapies proposed by Professor Coukos have been successfully tested and approved for lung, liver and kidney cancers.

References

  1. Schmidt, Charles (Nov 2015). "Immunology: Another shot at cancer". Nature. 527 (7578): S105–S107. Bibcode:2015Natur.527S.105S. doi: 10.1038/527S105a . ISSN   1476-4687. PMID   26580157. S2CID   4463236.
  2. 1 2 3 "For Authors | JAMA Oncology | JAMA Network". jamanetwork.com. Retrieved 2022-04-07.
  3. Disis, Mary L. (2015-04-01). "Announcing JAMA Oncology". JAMA Oncology. 1 (1): 15–16. doi:10.1001/jamaoncol.2014.239. ISSN   2374-2437. PMID   26182296. S2CID   11913399.
  4. 1 2 "Mary L. (Nora) Disis, M.D." Fred Hutch. Retrieved 2022-04-07.
  5. Daher, Natalie (2018-04-12). "A new, personalized vaccine is targeting the deadliest cancers in America". CNBC. Retrieved 2022-04-07.