Speakers 

Dr Christine Berg
Chief, Early Detection Research Group
Division of Cancer Prevention, NIH, USA

Christine D. Berg, M.D. is Chief, Early Detection Research Group, Division of Cancer Prevention, National Cancer Institute.  In this position, she is Project Officer for the Prostate, Lung, Colorectal and Ovarian Cancer Screening Trial (PLCO) and the National Lung Screening Trial (NLST). The NLST is a joint project of the American College of Radiology Imaging Network and the Lung Screening Study, Division of Cancer Prevention.  The PLCO and the NLST have recently successfully concluded.  The prostate, lung and ovarian final manuscripts have been published and the colorectal manuscript is in preparation.  The results of the NLST were reported in the New England Journal of Medicine on August 4, 2011 documenting a 20% decrease in lung cancer specific mortality with the utilization of low-dose helical computerized tomographic screening. Additionally, she has responsibility for the utilization of the PLCO Biorepository which is a national resource for validation of markers of early detection and for the molecular epidemiology of cancer.  She previously worked at Suburban Hospital as the Cancer Center Director and at the Georgetown University Medical School Lombardi Cancer Center as the head of Breast Cancer radiation oncology and as director of the residency training program. 
She is board certified in Internal Medicine, Medical Oncology and Radiation Oncology.

Professor Robert Bast
Professor of Gynaecological Oncology
MD Anderson, USA

Dr. Bast is best known for developing the OC125 monoclonal antibody that led to the production of the CA125 radioimmunoassay. Serum CA125 levels have provided the first generally useful marker for monitoring the course of patients with epithelial ovarian cancer. CA125 is currently being evaluated as one component of a screening strategy for ovarian cancer. Dr. Bast’s early studies focused on the use of immunostimulants and monoclonal antibodies for cancer therapy.   Over the last 15 years, Dr. Bast’s group has pioneered in defining molecular alterations in ovarian  and breast cancers that might serve as targets for therapy as well as diagnosis. His group discovered ARHI (DIRAS3), a novel ras-related imprinted tumor suppressor gene that regulates growth, motility, autophagy and tumor dormancy. Recent studies have demonstrated that the SIK2 kinase regulates centrosome splitting and paclitaxel sensitivity. Overall, Dr. Bast has published more than 600 articles and chapters and has edited the textbook Cancer Medicine.  He has been recognized by the Institute for Scientific Information (ISI) as one of the most frequently cited scientists in his field (top 0.5%). He continues to care for patients with breast and ovarian cancer and has been listed in the Best Doctors of America and in America’s Top Physicians.

Dr Patrick Brown
Stanford University School of Medicine, USA

 Patrick O. Brown received a BA, MD and PhD from the University of Chicago.  In his thesis work, with Nick Cozzarelli, investigating the molecular mechanisms of DNA topoisomerases, he discovered that these enzymes work by passing one DNA molecule through another.  Brown completed residency training in pediatrics in 1985, at Chicago’s Children’s Memorial Hospital.  In a post-doctoral fellowship at the University of California, San Francisco, with Mike Bishop and Harold Varmus, he characterized the mechanism by which retroviruses, such as HIV, incorporate their genes into the genomes of their hosts. In 1988, he joined the Howard Hughes Medical Institute and Stanford University School of Medicine, where he is currently a professor in the Department of Biochemistry. Dr. Brown’s research uses DNA microarrays, high-throughput sequencing and other “genomic” approaches to explore a wide range of fundamental questions in gene regulation, cell biology, physiology, development, and medicine. These studies provide clues to basic molecular and cellular mechanisms underlying the development and progression of cancers and other diseases, which the Brown lab is actively pursuing.   He is also working to develop and apply new molecular profiling methods for early detection and diagnosis of diverse diseases. Dr. Brown co-founded and serves as a co-director of the Public Library of Science (PLoS), an innovative non-profit publisher dedicated to making the results and discoveries from scientific and medical research into a public resource, freely available online anywhere in the world.  Brown is a member of the US National Academy of Science and Institute of Medicine.

Professor Christopher P Crum
Professor, Department of Pathology, Harvard Medical School
Director, Women's and Perinatal Pathology, Brigham and Women's Hospital, USA

Dr. Crum was born in Virginia and attended medical school and pathology residency at the University of Virginia. He received his training in obstetrical and gynecologic pathology at Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons and is currently Director of Women’s and Perinatal Pathology at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston. He has been Professor of Pathology at Harvard Medical School since 1997. In the early 1980’s., Crum collaborated with Harold zur Hausen’s group to link uterine cervical precancers to HPV16, then devoted nearly 20 years to defining the relationship between HPV and early cervical neoplasia. In the late 1990’s he established a collaboration with Professor Frank McKeon at Harvard Medical School - whose lab cloned the p53 homolog p63 - to determine the role of this gene in stem cell biology of the skin and female genital tract. In 2005, this collaboration expanded to the study of early serous carcinogenesis in the oviduct. Crum and his colleagues proposed that a high percentage of early serous carcinomas in women with germ-line BRCA1 or BRCA2 mutations originated in the fallopian tube. They further described a benign serous cancer precursor in the tube called the “p53 signature” that they found in continuity with early tubal cancer. More recently, they have identified mucosal proliferations – termed secretory cell outgrowths or “SCOUTs” – in the benign fallopian tubes of women and have linked them to increasing age, pelvic cancer, and a series of functional gene disturbances also seen in ovarian cancer. Currently, Crum, McKeon and Dr. Wa Xian, of the Institute of Medical Biology in Singapore, are investigating the role of oviductal stem cells in the pathogenesis of pelvic serous cancers. Dr. Crum directs a full-service academic division of women’s pathology at Brigham and Women’s Hospital. He has published over 275 articles and is the senior editor of Diagnostic Gynecologic and Obstetric Pathology, a major textbook in this field.

Professor Simon Gayther
Professor of Preventive Medicine
University of Southern California, USA

Dr Gayther is currently Professor in Preventive Medicine at the University of Southern California, Los Angeles. He began his career in ovarian cancer research working with Professor Sir Bruce Ponder’s team at the University of Cambridge, searching for the BRCA1 and BRCA2 susceptibility genes, which are largely responsible for the breast-ovarian cancer syndrome. A major part of this work was gaining an understanding of the role and contribution of these genes to familial ovarian cancer, and defining the variations in breast and ovarian cancer risks associated with different BRCA1/2 mutations. Dr Gayther continued his work in ovarian cancer susceptibility genetics after joining Professor Ian Jacobs’ team, first at Barts and the London and then at University College London. Together with Dr Paul Pharoah at University of Cambridge, Dr Gayther established an international collaboration to identify common low-penetance susceptibility alleles for ovarian cancer. This developed into the Ovarian Cancer Association Consortium (OCAC), which has since became the worlds largest population based ovarian cancer case collection for identifying genetic and epidemiological risk factors for the disease. Drs Gayther and Pharoah led the first genome wide association study for ovarian cancer, which recently identified several novel susceptibility alleles for the disease. The long-term aim of these studies is to reduce mortality from ovarian cancer by developing risk prediction strategies that identify the proportion of the general population at greatest disease risk, and then to target these women for clinical intervention strategies, such as biomarker screening for detecting early stage disease.

Professor Ian Jacobs
Dean, Faculty of Medical and Human Sciences & Vice President
The University of Manchester, UK

Since April 2011, Professor Ian Jacobs took up the position of Dean of the Faculty of Medical/Human Sciences & Vice President of The University of Manchester.  He is also Director of Manchester Academic Health Science Centre.   Previous to this, from 2009, he was Dean of the Faculty of Biomedical Sciences at UCL.  From 2006 – 2010, Professor Jacobs was Director of the Comprehensive Biomedical Research Centre at UCLH/UCL and Research Director UCL Partners Academic Health Science System (2009-11).

Ian directs a laboratory and clinical research team focused on genetics, proteomics, imaging and biomarkers in detection and screening for gynaecological cancers and holds awards >£25m from MRC, CRUK and DH.  He is PI on several large multicentre clinical trials including the UK Collaborative Trial of Ovarian Cancer Screening (UKCTOCS) involving 202,000 participants in 13 collaborating UK centres and the UK Familial Ovarian Cancer Screening Study (UKFOCSS). 

He qualified at Cambridge University and the Middlesex Hospital, obtained accreditation in obstetrics and gynaecology working at the Royal London and Rosie Maternity Cambridge and specialist accreditation as a surgical  gynaecological oncologist at Bart’s and The Royal Marsden.  He completed an MD Thesis at QMUL, the CRUK McElwain Fellowship at Cambridge University and an MRC Travelling Fellowship at Duke University, North Carolina.  In 2005 he established the Uganda Women’s Health Initiative which he Chairs and conducts a series of projects in Uganda including a cervical screening programme. 

He has been President of the British Gynaecological Cancer Society (2001-2004) and of the European Society of Gynaecological Oncology (2005-7).  He is Medical Director of the Eve Appeal (Gynaecology Cancer research fund), a Patron of Safehands for Women, a consultant to Becton Dickinson, non-Executive Director of Abcodia Ltd and holds an NIHR Senior Investigator Award.  Ian’s other interests include his family, running, football (Arsenal fan), gadgets and travel.

Dr Susanne Kruger-Kjaer
Danish Cancer Registry,
Denmark                                                                                                                                                                   

 Susanne Krüger Kjær is a medical graduate from The University of Copenhagen, Demark.  From September 2005, she was appointed Professor, University of Copenhagen, Denmark.  From 1982 – 1985, Professor Krüger Kjær held positions of clinical employment at Departments of Surgery, Medicine and Gynecology & Obstetrics, Hvidovre Hospital, University of Copenhagen, Denmark.  Scientific employment includes current posts of Head of Department (Viruses, Hormones and Cancer) of tthe Danish Cancer Society, Institute of Cancer Epidemiology, and Professor at the Juliane Marie Center (Obstetrics and Gynecology), Rigshospitalet, Copenhagen University.

Professor Krüger Kjær has held a post at the Nordic Summer School since 1991, teaching medical students on topics such as Cancer Epidemiology. She is also the principal supervisor for more than 25 Ph.D. students.

From 2006-2010, Professor Krüger Kjær was a ,ember of the scientific committee of the Danish Cancer Society.  She has also been a member of various international scientific committees within the field of HPV research and ovarian cancer research.  She is a Journal Peer Reviewer for more than 25 scientific medical journals  

Professor Krüger Kjær is involved in research in gynecologic cancers with focus on cervical cancer and human papillomavirus and ovarian cancer. She is the primary investigator of the Danish MALOVA study and is part of the ovarian cancer consortia OCAC and COGS. She is also a member of DMEC for the UKCTOCS trial, and has more than 290 scientific publications in peer reviewed journals and 300 oral presentations/posters.

Dr Anna Lokshin
Associate Professor of Medicine, Pathology and Obstetrics and Gynaecology
University of Pittsburgh, USA

Dr. Lokshin is an Associate Professor of Medicine with joint appointments as Associate Professor of Pathology and Ob/Gyn Reproductive Sciences. Dr. Lokshin is also a Director of Luminex Core Facility of UPCI. Dr. Lokshin's research is focused on identification of cancer biomarkers for screening, diagnosis, prognosis, and disease monitoring of solid tumor cancers including ovarian, endometrial, breast, lung, pancreatic, HCC, and others. Dr. Lokshin is utilizing multiplexing approach that enables analysis of over hundred of candidate proteins in small blood sample. This approach allows for identification of proteins whose associations with particular cancers have not been previously reported, such as prolactin, eotaxin-1, RANTES, and others. Dr. Lokshins's laboratory investigates the roles and mechanisms of activity of these proteins in several cancers. Dr. Lokshin's laboratory also studies cancer stem cells, cancer stem cells biomarkers, and mechanisms of cancer stem cells drug resistance.

Professor Usha Menon
Professor of Gynaecological Oncology
University College London, UK

Usha Menon is Professor of Gynaecological Oncology and Head of Gynaecological Cancer Research Centre at the UCL Elizabeth Garrett Anderson Institute for Women’s Health and Consultant Gynaecologist, UCLH NHS Trust, London.

The focus of her research is risk prediction, screening and early detection of gynaecological malignancies particularly ovarian cancer. She is senior investigator on the UK ovarian cancer screening trials and on studies exploring symptoms in ovarian cancer. The former includes the UK Collaborative Trial of Ovarian Cancer Screening - a randomised control trial of 202,000 women with mortality as the end point. Other interests are genetic and environmental risk factors and novel biomarkers in ovarian cancer. She has to date over 120 publications. The research has attracted funding from Medical Research Council, Cancer Research UK, Department of Health and the Eve Appeal amounting to over £25 million.

Her main clinical interest is management of women at increased risk of familial gynaecological cancers. She is Lead Clinician for the Familial Gynaecological Cancer service at UCLH

Dr Edward Pavlik
University of Kentucky, Chandler Medical Center
Markey Cancer Center, USA

Edward J Pavlik graduated from the University of Denver with a B.S. in mathematics & chemistry and a M.S. in cell biology.  He received his Ph.D. from the University of Tennessee, Knoxville and did his NIH NCI Postdoctoral fellowship at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign.  He is currently Director of the UK Ovarian Screening Research Program at the University of Kentucky/ Markey Cancer Center in Lexington, Kentucky.  His major research interest is in the early detection of ovarian cancer, especially identifying factors that improve or confound early detection.  Dr. Pavlik distributes a free monthly list of significant new literature in gynecologic oncology (Ed’s List – In The Know), which has an international distribution of 600+ subscribers. 

During his career, Dr. Pavlik has received >$2.8M in research funding and published 96 articles in peer-reviewed journals.  He has also authored two books in the scientific literature and written three novels (One Freak Day, Very Happy To Be Here! and The DeSoto Mission, all available at Amazon.com).  He is Director of Coaching for the Lexington Youth Soccer Association, organizes summer and winter soccer camps as well as seasonal player development clinics.  He plays in Lexington’s adult futball league and enjoys biking.  Dr. Pavlik is married to Katherine Nelson and has adult children Thomas & Katherine.

Dr Paul Pharoah
Senior Clinical Research Fellow
University of Cambridge, UK

Dr Paul Pharoah studied clinical medicine at the Universities of Cambridge and Oxford and graduated in 1986.  After a series of hospital posts in internal medicine, he moved to Malawi where he was the medical officer on a large leprosy vaccine trial.  In 1992 he returned to the UK and began my formal training in public health medicine on the Anglia and Oxford Regional training scheme.  In 1996 Dr Pharoah took up a clinical research fellowship in the CRC Human Cancer Genetics Group with Professor Sir Bruce Ponder in 1996.  Having completed doctoral studies in 1999, he won a Cancer Research UK Senior Clinical Research fellowship.  This enabled the development of an independent research programme and in 2004 he was successful in obtaining programme grant funding and the Fellowship was renewed for another 5 years.  This programme was refunded for a further five years from October 2008 and Dr Pharoah was appointed Reader in Cancer Epidemiology by the University of Cambridge in 2009. 

Major research interests have included i) common genetic variation and breast and ovarian cancer susceptibility ii) methodological issues in investigating the polygenic basis of cancer susceptibility (gene-gene interaction) and iii) the role of germline genotype in determining the clinico-pathological characteristics of breast and ovarian cancer.  In 2005 Dr Pharoah initiated two major, successful international research consortia – the Breast Cancer Association Consortium and the Ovarian Cancer Association Consortium.

Dr Adam Rosenthal
Senior Lecturer in Gynaecological Oncology
QMUL Medical School, Barts and the London NHS Trust, UK

Adam Rosenthal is Senior Lecturer and Consultant Gynaecological Oncologist at Barts Cancer Institute/St. Bartholomew’s Hospital, London and Honorary Senior Lecturer at University College London. He qualified MB BS from St. Mary’s Hospital Medical School in 1992 with an intercalated BSc in physiology. He undertook general obstetrics and gynaecology training on the North West London rotation and completed a PhD in the molecular biology of vulval cancer at St. Bartholomew’s Hospital. Whilst there, he also helped to develop the first randomised trial of ovarian cancer screening in the general population using the novel “risk of ovarian cancer algorithm”. He was part of the team which published the first evidence that ovarian cancer screening may improve survival. He completed subspecialty training in gynaecological oncology surgery, including advanced laparoscopic techniques, at University College Hospital, London. He has been Co-investigator and Clinical Lead on the UK Familial Ovarian Cancer Screening Study since 2004 and has published widely on ovarian cancer screening in both the general and high risk populations. His main clinical interests are laparoscopic surgery for gynaecological cancers, pre-invasive diseases of the female genital tract and managing familial gynaecological cancer.

Dr Steve Skates
Associate Professor of Medicine (Biostatistics)
Harvard Medicial School, USA

Steven J. Skates PhD, is an Associate Professor of Medicine (Biostatistics) at Harvard Medical School and Massachusetts General Hospital. He has had a long standing research interest in early detection of ovarian cancer. His collaborations with Professor Ian Jacobs and colleagues in the UK began in the early 90's and include development of a longitudinal CA125 algorithm based on data from the ovarian cancer screening trials in the UK and Sweden conducted in the late 80's and early 90's. A subsequent prospective screening trial led to a refinement of the algorithm, termed the Risk of Ovarian Cancer Algorithm (ROCA), now in use in the UKCTOCS trial, a large randomized 200,000 normal risk postmenopausal women. ROCA is also being tested in four other screening trials in the US and UK. It is based on the observation that most women have their own individual baseline CA125 level, and statistically significant elevations above this level are the first potential signs of undetected ovarian cancer.  In addition to design of screening trials and design of screening algorithms, Dr. Skates' research has recently extended to the search for new serum biomarkers for ovarian cancer that reinforce or complement the information in existing longitudinal CA125 levels..

Professor Dirk Timmerman
Clinical Head of Gynaecology
University Hospitals Gasthuisberg Campus, Belgium

Professor in Obstetrics and Gynaecology at KU Leuven and head of benign gynaecology and gynaecological ultrasound at the University Hospitals Leuven, Belgium. His main interest is gynaecological ultrasound and detection and staging of gynaecological cancers. In 1997 he defended a doctoral thesis on “Ultrasonography in the assessment of ovarian and tamoxifen-associated endometrial pathology”. He is coordinator of the International Ovarian Tumour Analysis (IOTA) collaborative group including more than 30 centres throughout the world. He co-authored more than 200 papers in international scientific journals. He is past Editor of the journal Ultrasound in Obstetrics and Gynecology. Since 2003 he is elected Board Member of ISUOG (International Society of Ultrasound in Obstetrics and Gynecology).