Maggie Cheang

Biography

Search eg. Breast cancer  Search  Facebook  Twitter  Youtube  LinkedIn  RSS News Blogs Videos Contacts The Institute of Cancer ResearchAdvanced search Making the discoveries that defeat cancer Donate now  Our Research  Studying at the ICR  Careers  Working with Industry  Support Us  About Us  HomeOur ResearchResearchers and teamsDr Maggie Cheang Dr Maggie CheangTeam LeaderThe alt textDr Maggie Cheang develops genomics classifiers for tumour subtypes and determines their clinical utility to predict sensitivity of each tumour type to therapeutic agents in phase II and III clinical trials. She co-invented the 50 genes-based classifier for the intrinsic subtypes of breast cancer, commonly known as PAM50. Team: Genomic Analysis – Clinical Trials T 020 8722 4552  Biography Dr Maggie Cheang grew up in Vancouver, Canada and obtained her PhD in Pathology and Laboratory Medicine under the supervision of Professor Torsten Nielsen from the University of British Columbia in Canada. She then received a prestigious Canadian Cancer Society/Terry Fox Foundation Postdoctoral Fellowship to train with Professor Charles Perou, a pioneer in identifying subtypes of breast cancer, at the Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center at the University of North Carolina, US. Her work has been instrumental in the identification and validation of multiple clinically recognised biomarkers, one of which has been implemented into clinical practice guidelines. Her research achievements have been internationally recognised by numerous awards, grants and memberships. She was a Merit Award recipient at the American Society of Clinical Oncology Meeting in 2011 and received a Clinical Science Scholar Scholarship at the CTRC-AACR San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium in 2011. Dr Cheang was also a recipient of a Career Development Award for Junior Faculty funded by ReThink Breast Cancer Canada in 2011–12; two Novartis Oncology Young Canadian Investigator Awards (2011, 2008); and a National Cancer Institute of Canada Traveling Award for senior graduate students (2007–08). She consults on several trial management and translational research committees for phase II and III trials. As a mark of her standing in the field, she currently serves as an Associate Editor of BMC Cancer, and a Steering Committee member for the National Cancer Research Institute (NCRI) CM-Path Clinical Trials Pathology Advisory Group (CT-PAG) and leads the Biomarker reference subgroup within the Cellular Molecular – Pathology Initiative (Discovery work stream).

Research Interest

We are a multidisciplinary group of statistical, computational and translational scientists (in collaboration with the laboratory scientists) in the ICR's Clinical Trials and Statistics Unit (ICR-CTSU) and the Division of Clinical Studies. We develop novel and efficient analytical methods for the application of high-dimensional genomic and proteomic data generated from biospecimens collected in clinical trials in order to: identify genomic signatures for the selection of patients for specific chemotherapy and biologically targeted agents, identify biological endpoints for emerging therapeutic targets, and study the underlying biology of tumours from “exceptional” drug responders in various therapeutic agents across tumour types. The ICR-CTSU provides a unique and rare opportunity for our translational genomics group to be integral to the trial management and classic statistical analysis environment. Using a systemic approach, we will develop statistical analytic tools for studying the relationship between survival data and high-dimensional genomic data. These include variable selection methods, ensemble learning and cross-data-type prediction to incorporate other data types like DNA copy number, methylation, and proteomics as available into our predictive algorithms, used for stratified medicine