Clinical Consultants
Professor A. Hilary Calvert, MB BChir MSc MD FRCP FMedSci
Hilary Calvert is the Clinical Director of the Northern Institute for Cancer Research and Professor of Medical Oncology at the University of Newcastle Upon Tyne, England. His training is in Medicine, Mathematics and Biochemistry. He has had a long involvement in anticancer drug development working at the Institute for Cancer Research at the Royal Marsden Hospital in London from 1977. During this period he was responsible for the introduction of carboplatin into clinical practice and its subsequent clinical development in ovarian cancer. He also led the group developing folate-based inhibitors of thymidylate synthase, leading eventually to the licensing of Tomudex™ (ratitrexed) with Astrazeneca. Since 1989 he has worked in the University of Newcastle upon Tyne implemeting a program of drug development aimed at using the molecular pathology of human cancers to define targets, developing drugs aimed at those targets and performing preclinical and clinical studies. He also runs a major clinical trials program with up to eight Phase I studies of anticancer drugs open at any given time in addition to Phase II and III studies. The clinical trials unit in Newcastle is on of the key centres for Cancer Research UK and for the UK National Translational Research Committee in Cancer (NTRAC)
Professor Ian Judson, MA MB BChir MD FRCP
Prof Judson has many years of experience in the development of new anticancer drugs. The Drug Development Unit at the Royal Marsden is focused on the clinical investigation of novel anticancer agents incorporating “proof of principle” pharmacodynamic biomarker studies, including functional imaging. Prof Judson has also been involved in the management of sarcomas for a number of years. He is Vice-Chairman of the EORTC Soft Tissue and Bone Sarcoma Group, a member of the NCRI Sarcoma Clinical Studies Group and current President of the British Sarcoma Group. He is PI for a number of international sarcoma trials and has a special interest in Gastrointestinal Stromal Tumours (GISTs).
Professor Hagop Kantarjian, MD
Dr. Kantarjian is currently serving as Professor of Medicine and Chairman of the Department of Leukemia at MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, Texas, where he has been since joining as a fellow in the Department of Developmental Therapeutics in 1981. Hagop specializes in leukemia and holds an interest in creating new treatment approaches for these diseases. Hagop has authored and contributed to over 560 medical publications, articles and abstracts and, for his accomplishments, has received awards, including a Leukemia Society of America Scholarship from 1989-1994 and a Leukemia Society of America Special Fellow Scholarship from 1982-1983.
Professor Stan Kaye, BSc MD FRCP FRCR FRSE FMedSci
Stan Kaye is Professor of Medical Oncology at Royal Marsden Hospital and Head of the Section of Medicine at the Institute of Cancer Research, London. He took up this position in September 2000 after 20 years in Glasgow (the last 15 as Head of Dept. of Medical Oncology in the University). He has major interests in drug development, drug resistance and ovarian cancer and has published over 300 peer-reviewed articles on these and other topics. He is currently overseeing a major expansion of Phase I trial activity at the Royal Marsden Hospital; a new clinical trials centre has just opened there (November 2004) with 16 beds and the capacity to enter 300 patients per year into up to 20 trials. He works very closely with Prof. Paul Workman; their joint programme is particularly focussed on developing and evaluating novel molecular targeted agents. Prof Kaye has significant responsibility within Cancer Research UK, the world’s largest cancer charity, in which he chairs a new joint translational/clinical trial research committee and is a member of its Scientific Executive Board.
Daruka Mahadevan, MD PhD
Daruka Mahadevan is Assistant Professor of Medicine and Director of Drug Development at the University of Arizona Cancer Center. He received his Ph.D. in structural biology at the University of London, and completed his M.D. at Kings College in London. He was a Fogarty International post-doctoral Fellow at the National Cancer Institute, NIH and served as a Senior Research Scientist in the Antibody Engineering and Cancer Therapeutics group of Celltech Therapeutics, UK. He completed Internal Medicine residency at the University of Connecticut and Hematology/Oncology fellowship at the Arizona Cancer Center. Dr. Mahadevan is board-certified in Internal Medicine and Medical Oncology and is active in the design and execution of clinical trials for investigational agents.
Professor Bruce Ponder, MB PhD FRCP FRCPath FMedSci FRS
Bruce Ponder is Professor and Head of the Department of Oncology, University of Cambridge and Director of the Cancer Research UK Cambridge Research Institute, and Co-Director of the Strangeways Research Laboratory for Genetic Epidemiology. His research interests are in common genetic variation and susceptibility to cancer, and his group have just completed a large (250,000) SNP genome scan for breast cancer. For the past ten years he has also been leading the development of the cancer clinical research developments on the Addenbrooke’s site.
Professor Lesley Seymour, MD PhD FCP(SA) FRCPC
Dr Seymour received her MD and subsequently completed specialist training in Internal Medicine and later Clinical Haematology and Medical Oncology. After eight years as a Senior Consultant in the Division of Clinical Haematology and Medical Oncology at the University of Witwatersrand, she spent two years with Zeneca in the United Kingdom. She then relocated in Canada as the Director of Medical Oncology at the Newfoundland Cancer Treatment and Research Foundation. In 1996 Dr Seymour took up her current position as co-Director of the Investigational New Drug Program at the NCIC CTG, where her primary responsibilities are Phase I and II studies of novel compounds, as well as research into lung malignancies. She also holds the position of Professor in the Department of Oncology, Faculty of Health Sciences, Queen’s University.
Dr Seymour has served on many provincial, national and international committees and grants panels, including Cancer Care Ontario, National Cancer Institute of Canada, National Cancer Institute and the American Society of Clinical Oncology.
Daniel D. Von Hoff, MD FACP
Daniel D. Von Hoff, M.D., is currently Senior Investigator and Head of Translational Research at the Translational Genomics Research Institute (TGen) in Phoenix, Arizona.
Dr. Von Hoff's major interest is in the development of new anticancer agents, both in the clinic and in the laboratory. His laboratory interests and contributions have been in the areas of in vitro drug sensitivity testing for individualizing treatment for patients, mechanisms of gene amplification, particularly of extrachromosomal DNA, and understanding of and targeting telomere maintenance mechanisms. Dr. Von Hoff and his laboratory team are currently concentrating on discovery of new targets in pancreatic cancer.
In the area of clinical drug development, Dr. Von Hoff and his colleagues were involved in the early development of many of the agents now used routinely, including: Mitoxantrone, Findarabine, Paclitaxel, Docetaxel, Gemcitabine, CPT-11, Iressa®, Tarceva® and others. At present, he and his colleagues are concentrating on the development of molecularly targeted therapies.
Dr. Von Hoff has published more than 515 papers, 129 book chapters, and more than 858 abstracts.
Dr. Von Hoff is the past President of the American Association for Cancer Research, a Fellow of the American College of Physicians, and a member and past board member of the American Society of Clinical Oncology. He was a founder and board member of ILEX™ Oncology, Inc. which was recently acquired by Genzyme Corporation. He is founder and the Editor Emeritus of Investigational New Drugs - The Journal of New Anticancer Agents; and, Editor-in-Chief of Molecular Cancer Therapeutics. He is also proud to have been a mentor and teacher for multiple medical students, medical oncology fellows, graduate students, and post-doctoral fellows.