Another exciting few months! Hard to believe the Year is nearing the end!​

 

Major update: Ben received the amazing news that his application for Tenure and Promotion to Associate Professor was approved by the Provost and the President of Columbia University. More details on how we will celebrate soon!​
 

Papers --- 

Karan, who just started his PhD portion of his MD/PhD in the lab has published a wonderful analysis of rare sarcomas in Clinical Cancer Research! He also got the Cover of the issue!!

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/39083415/ 

​

Our close collaborators from the Sam Bakhoum lab at MSKCC have reported a beautiful study on why micronuclei collapse. The paper was published in Science and featured on the Cover. We were fortunate to contribute a small part. https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.adj8691 

​

A lot of cool research from all over the world moved the needle in 2024. Here are some reflections published in Cancer Discovery that Ben was invited to contribute to. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/39618282/ 

​

People--- 

People are moving on to greater things!

​

Carino has finished a post-doc in record time (hopefully some news about his paper soon!). Good luck Carino, we are not worried about you and we are excited to see what you contribute to the GI Oncology field and beyond.

 

​​New members are joining!

 

Welcome to Chris Frangieh, PhD, who joins us from MIT. We have had the pleasure of working with Chris for years, and are thrilled that he joined the lab to move forward some of our most exciting ideas in cell engineering. 

Three (!) new MD/PhD students are planning to join the lab in Summer 2025. More to come! 

​

Honors, Awards, and Grants---

Congrats to MD/PhD students Zach Walsh and Edridge D'Souza who both received outstanding (and fundable) scores on their F30 applications!

​

Congrats to Clarissa who has received word that her 2-year fellowship from the Deutsche Forschungsgesellschaft (DFG) will be funded. 

​

Ben received the incredible honor of being selected as the Seldin~Smith for Pioneering Research from the American Society for Clinical Investigation (ASCI). As part of this award, Ben will deliver the Seldin-Smith Physician-Scientist Lecture at the Seldin Symposium at UT Southwestern, and a presentation at the Annual ASCI meeting in Chicago in 2025.​

​

Ben was selected as one of five Cancer Research Institute  Lloyd J. Old STAR awardees. This Award will provide $1,250,000 in funding for some of the most high-risk projects in cell and genome engineering that are ongoing in the lab. https://www.cancer.columbia.edu/news/ben-izar-md-joins-new-cohort-cancer-research-institute-lloyd-j-old-stars ​

It has been an incredibly exciting and productive few months in the lab.​

 

Papers --- 

Harsha's paper on the role of pyroptosis in dormancy and reactivation was published in Nature Cancer. This work was largely performed in the late Filippo Giancotti's laboratory (https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/38195932/)

​

Meri's paper on liver-metastatic organotropism was published in Nature Cancer! (https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/38286827/) 

​

A major paper from the Alberto Ciccia's laboratory describing an intriguing role of SMARCAL1 in regulating innate immunity and PD-L1 expression. Members of our lab (Tricia) contribtued to this work published in Cell. (https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/38301646/)

​

Massive congratulations to Zach Walsh whose paper on cell engineering using base editing was published in Nature Biotechnology. This was an incredible effort by multiple lab members (Johannes, Parin) and rotation students (Shiv, Neeha) among others. (https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/38783148/)

​

People--- 

People are moving on to greater things!

​

Johannes matched at the Clinician-Scientist Program at Columbia University and will start his Internal Medicine Residency in June! Congrats Johannes, so proud of you!

​

Meri graduated the lab to start her own lab - more details soon!!! Can't wait to see work from your own lab!

​

Jana accepted an awesome role as computational biologist at Pfizer. All the best Jana, they are lucky to have you! 

​

Shiv went on to start residency at Weill Cornell/Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center. We are sad to see you leave, but we will get you back! 

​

New folks are joining!
 

Welcome Ron Gejman, a medical oncology fellow at Columbia who will do a post-doctoral fellowship to tackle some of the most difficult challenges in metastatic relapse. 

 

Welcome Associate Research Scientist Azzurra Cottarelli, who comes with incredible experience in blood brain barrier biology who will do amazing work at the interface of neurobiology and metastasis.

 

Welcome to 4 (!!) rotating students from the MD/PhD program - Jared Pollard, Sarah Grauman, Akul Naik and Dev Biswas who will do cutting-edge work in cell engineering and metastasis biology with Zach, Johannes, Lindsay and Leon.
 

Achievements, Prizes and Awards --- 

Congrats to MD/PhD students Edridge D'Souza and Luke Cai who passed their qualifying exam with flying colors! 

​

Zach won multiple awards and scholarships, including the Keystone Symposia Future of Science Fund Scholarship, the Broad Institute Mutational Scanning Symposium Travel Scholarship and the Broad Institute Mutational Scanning Symposium Top Poster Prize - all within 2 months!!

​

Ben was awarded the Harold and Golden Lamport Research Award in Basic Sciences the Columbia University Vagelos College of Physicians and Surgeons - a huge honor. 

​

Grants ---

We received a generous grant from the Melanoma Research Alliance! After being awarded a Young Investigator award, we received a MRA Team Science Award to study neural-like differentiation in melanoma brain metastasis. This is a tight collaboration with Eva Hernando (NYU), Sheri Holmen (Huntsman Cancer Center) and David Schoenfeld (Yale).

​

Media ---

The Izar lab was featured in the VP&S  News Room: https://www.cuimc.columbia.edu/news/fighting-cancer-multiple-fronts.

 

Zach's paper was featured in the HICCC News Room! Worth a read! https://www.cancer.columbia.edu/news/improving-cell-therapy-creating-t-cell-super-soldiers 

Very productive month for the lab!​

​

Collaborative work on brain metastasis published in NPJ Precision Oncology: 

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41698-023-00471-z 

​

Perspective on how to go from human tissues to mechanisms published in Genes & Immunity (Johannes, Tricia and Meri)

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41435-023-00224-9

​

Collaborative work on new spatial transcriptomics method with Raul Rabadan's group published in Genome Biology (Yiping)

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/38110959/

​

Co-led study on peripheral immune correlates and response to immunotherapy in lung cancer (co-first author Zach)

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/38114518/

​

Ben delivered a Grand Rounds lecture at Thomas Jefferson University presenting work led by our incredible MD/PhD students Tricia, Lindsay and Zach, with support from our outstanding post-docs Johannes, Meri and Somnath.

 

Ben represented the lab at the first AI meets Cancer Research (AIMCR) meeting in Barcelona, Spain. An outstanding conference that was followed by another symposium at the University of Barcelona. Hope to come back next year and bring more lab members! 

Very productive month for the lab!​

​

Collaborative work on brain metastasis published in NPJ Precision Oncology: 

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41698-023-00471-z 

​

Perspective on how to go from human tissues to mechanisms published in Genes & Immunity (Johannes, Tricia and Meri)

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41435-023-00224-9

​

Collaborative work on new spatial transcriptomics method with Raul Rabadan's group published in Genome Biology (Yiping)

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/38110959/

​

Co-led study on peripheral immune correlates and response to immunotherapy in lung cancer (co-first author Zach)

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/38114518/

​

Ben delivered a Grand Rounds lecture at Thomas Jefferson University presenting work led by our incredible MD/PhD students Tricia, Lindsay and Zach, with support from our outstanding post-docs Johannes, Meri and Somnath.

 

Ben represented the lab at the first AI meets Cancer Research (AIMCR) meeting in Barcelona, Spain. An outstanding conference that was followed by another symposium at the University of Barcelona. Hope to come back next year and bring more lab members! 

Very productive month for the lab!​

​

Collaborative work on brain metastasis published in NPJ Precision Oncology: 

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41698-023-00471-z 

​

Perspective on how to go from human tissues to mechanisms published in Genes & Immunity (Johannes, Tricia and Meri)

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41435-023-00224-9

​

Collaborative work on new spatial transcriptomics method with Raul Rabadan's group published in Genome Biology (Yiping)

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/38110959/

​

Co-led study on peripheral immune correlates and response to immunotherapy in lung cancer (co-first author Zach)

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/38114518/

​

Ben delivered a Grand Rounds lecture at Thomas Jefferson University presenting work led by our incredible MD/PhD students Tricia, Lindsay and Zach, with support from our outstanding post-docs Johannes, Meri and Somnath.

 

Ben represented the lab at the first AI meets Cancer Research (AIMCR) meeting in Barcelona, Spain. An outstanding conference that was followed by another symposium at the University of Barcelona. Hope to come back next year and bring more lab members! 

Very productive month for the lab!​

​

Collaborative work on brain metastasis published in NPJ Precision Oncology: 

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41698-023-00471-z 

​

Perspective on how to go from human tissues to mechanisms published in Genes & Immunity (Johannes, Tricia and Meri)

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41435-023-00224-9

​

Collaborative work on new spatial transcriptomics method with Raul Rabadan's group published in Genome Biology (Yiping)

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/38110959/

​

Co-led study on peripheral immune correlates and response to immunotherapy in lung cancer (co-first author Zach)

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/38114518/

​

Ben delivered a Grand Rounds lecture at Thomas Jefferson University presenting work led by our incredible MD/PhD students Tricia, Lindsay and Zach, with support from our outstanding post-docs Johannes, Meri and Somnath.

 

Ben represented the lab at the first AI meets Cancer Research (AIMCR) meeting in Barcelona, Spain. An outstanding conference that was followed by another symposium at the University of Barcelona. Hope to come back next year and bring more lab members! 

Very productive month for the lab!​

​

Collaborative work on brain metastasis published in NPJ Precision Oncology: 

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41698-023-00471-z 

​

Perspective on how to go from human tissues to mechanisms published in Genes & Immunity (Johannes, Tricia and Meri)

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41435-023-00224-9

​

Collaborative work on new spatial transcriptomics method with Raul Rabadan's group published in Genome Biology (Yiping)

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/38110959/

​

Co-led study on peripheral immune correlates and response to immunotherapy in lung cancer (co-first author Zach)

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/38114518/

​

Ben delivered a Grand Rounds lecture at Thomas Jefferson University presenting work led by our incredible MD/PhD students Tricia, Lindsay and Zach, with support from our outstanding post-docs Johannes, Meri and Somnath.

 

Ben represented the lab at the first AI meets Cancer Research (AIMCR) meeting in Barcelona, Spain. An outstanding conference that was followed by another symposium at the University of Barcelona. Hope to come back next year and bring more lab members! 

Very productive month for the lab!​

​

Collaborative work on brain metastasis published in NPJ Precision Oncology: 

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41698-023-00471-z 

​

Perspective on how to go from human tissues to mechanisms published in Genes & Immunity (Johannes, Tricia and Meri)

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41435-023-00224-9

​

Collaborative work on new spatial transcriptomics method with Raul Rabadan's group published in Genome Biology (Yiping)

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/38110959/

​

Co-led study on peripheral immune correlates and response to immunotherapy in lung cancer (co-first author Zach)

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/38114518/

​

Ben delivered a Grand Rounds lecture at Thomas Jefferson University presenting work led by our incredible MD/PhD students Tricia, Lindsay and Zach, with support from our outstanding post-docs Johannes, Meri and Somnath.

 

Ben represented the lab at the first AI meets Cancer Research (AIMCR) meeting in Barcelona, Spain. An outstanding conference that was followed by another symposium at the University of Barcelona. Hope to come back next year and bring more lab members! 

Very productive month for the lab!​

​

Collaborative work on brain metastasis published in NPJ Precision Oncology: 

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41698-023-00471-z 

​

Perspective on how to go from human tissues to mechanisms published in Genes & Immunity (Johannes, Tricia and Meri)

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41435-023-00224-9

​

Collaborative work on new spatial transcriptomics method with Raul Rabadan's group published in Genome Biology (Yiping)

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/38110959/

​

Co-led study on peripheral immune correlates and response to immunotherapy in lung cancer (co-first author Zach)

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/38114518/

​

Ben delivered a Grand Rounds lecture at Thomas Jefferson University presenting work led by our incredible MD/PhD students Tricia, Lindsay and Zach, with support from our outstanding post-docs Johannes, Meri and Somnath.

 

Ben represented the lab at the first AI meets Cancer Research (AIMCR) meeting in Barcelona, Spain. An outstanding conference that was followed by another symposium at the University of Barcelona. Hope to come back next year and bring more lab members! 

Very productive month for the lab!​

​

Collaborative work on brain metastasis published in NPJ Precision Oncology: 

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41698-023-00471-z 

​

Perspective on how to go from human tissues to mechanisms published in Genes & Immunity (Johannes, Tricia and Meri)

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41435-023-00224-9

​

Collaborative work on new spatial transcriptomics method with Raul Rabadan's group published in Genome Biology (Yiping)

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/38110959/

​

Co-led study on peripheral immune correlates and response to immunotherapy in lung cancer (co-first author Zach)

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/38114518/

​

Ben delivered a Grand Rounds lecture at Thomas Jefferson University presenting work led by our incredible MD/PhD students Tricia, Lindsay and Zach, with support from our outstanding post-docs Johannes, Meri and Somnath.

 

Ben represented the lab at the first AI meets Cancer Research (AIMCR) meeting in Barcelona, Spain. An outstanding conference that was followed by another symposium at the University of Barcelona. Hope to come back next year and bring more lab members! 

Very productive month for the lab!​

​

Collaborative work on brain metastasis published in NPJ Precision Oncology: 

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41698-023-00471-z 

​

Perspective on how to go from human tissues to mechanisms published in Genes & Immunity (Johannes, Tricia and Meri)

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41435-023-00224-9

​

Collaborative work on new spatial transcriptomics method with Raul Rabadan's group published in Genome Biology (Yiping)

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/38110959/

​

Co-led study on peripheral immune correlates and response to immunotherapy in lung cancer (co-first author Zach)

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/38114518/

​

Ben delivered a Grand Rounds lecture at Thomas Jefferson University presenting work led by our incredible MD/PhD students Tricia, Lindsay and Zach, with support from our outstanding post-docs Johannes, Meri and Somnath.

 

Ben represented the lab at the first AI meets Cancer Research (AIMCR) meeting in Barcelona, Spain. An outstanding conference that was followed by another symposium at the University of Barcelona. Hope to come back next year and bring more lab members! 

Very productive month for the lab!​

​

Collaborative work on brain metastasis published in NPJ Precision Oncology: 

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41698-023-00471-z 

​

Perspective on how to go from human tissues to mechanisms published in Genes & Immunity (Johannes, Tricia and Meri)

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41435-023-00224-9

​

Collaborative work on new spatial transcriptomics method with Raul Rabadan's group published in Genome Biology (Yiping)

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/38110959/

​

Co-led study on peripheral immune correlates and response to immunotherapy in lung cancer (co-first author Zach)

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/38114518/

​

Ben delivered a Grand Rounds lecture at Thomas Jefferson University presenting work led by our incredible MD/PhD students Tricia, Lindsay and Zach, with support from our outstanding post-docs Johannes, Meri and Somnath.

 

Ben represented the lab at the first AI meets Cancer Research (AIMCR) meeting in Barcelona, Spain. An outstanding conference that was followed by another symposium at the University of Barcelona. Hope to come back next year and bring more lab members! 

Very productive month for the lab!​

​

Collaborative work on brain metastasis published in NPJ Precision Oncology: 

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41698-023-00471-z 

​

Perspective on how to go from human tissues to mechanisms published in Genes & Immunity (Johannes, Tricia and Meri)

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41435-023-00224-9

​

Collaborative work on new spatial transcriptomics method with Raul Rabadan's group published in Genome Biology (Yiping)

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/38110959/

​

Co-led study on peripheral immune correlates and response to immunotherapy in lung cancer (co-first author Zach)

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/38114518/

​

Ben delivered a Grand Rounds lecture at Thomas Jefferson University presenting work led by our incredible MD/PhD students Tricia, Lindsay and Zach, with support from our outstanding post-docs Johannes, Meri and Somnath.

 

Ben represented the lab at the first AI meets Cancer Research (AIMCR) meeting in Barcelona, Spain. An outstanding conference that was followed by another symposium at the University of Barcelona. Hope to come back next year and bring more lab members!