Jonathan Spicer, M.D., Ph.D.
Dr. Spicer is recognized as a leader in understanding how neutrophils impact cancer progression, in particular, the role of NETs in cancer biology, and has developed one of the most active research programs in the area of neoadjuvant immunotherapy for operable lung cancer.
Dr. Spicer is a seasoned surgeon scientist that currently serves as an Associate Professor of Surgery at McGill University and Medical Director of the McGill University Health Center (MUHC) Thoracic Oncology Network. Dr. Spicer also leads a broad research program covering basic, translational, and clinical research topics. Additionally, Dr. Spicer chairs the McGill Regional Thoracic Oncology Tumor Board and is Co-Director of the MUHC Thoracic Oncology Clinical Trials Unit. He is the Program Director for the McGill Advanced Thoracic and Upper GI Surgical Oncology Fellowship.
Dr. Spicer is the Research Chair for the Canadian Association of Thoracic Surgeons, Director of the Canadian Cancer Trials Mesothelioma Working Group and sits on numerous steering committees for Phase 2 and 3 international trials investigating the use of novel therapies prior to lung cancer resections. He trained in general surgery at McGill University where earned his MD and subsequently in cardiothoracic surgery at the University of Texas, MD Anderson Cancer Centre.
Allan Tsung, M.D.
Dr. Tsung currently serves as Chair of the Department of Surgery at the University of Virginia (“UVA”) School of Medicine and Director of the Cancer Therapeutics program at the University of Virginia Comprehensive Cancer Center.
Dr. Tsung specializes in evaluating and caring for patients with liver, bile duct and pancreas cancers and is an expert in laparoscopic and robotic surgery. He is also committed to mentoring other physicians and developing future generations of surgeon scientists. Before joining UVA, Dr. Tsung served as Director of Surgical Oncology at the Ohio State James Comprehensive Cancer Center and Co-Director of the Gastrointestinal Clinical Trials portfolio. Prior to Ohio State, Dr. Tsung served as Vice Chair of Research for the Department of Surgery at the University of Pittsburgh, where he mentored junior faculty and led the development of a new research curriculum for surgical residents. His research efforts are focused on turning laboratory cancer research breakthroughs into treatment options for patients, having co-authored more than 300 peer-reviewed publications and served as principal investigator on multiple National Institutes of Health grants. He also studies the socioeconomic factors that lead to disparities in health outcomes for patients receiving cancer treatment. In addition, Dr. Tsung is the President of the Society of Asian Academic Surgeons, Secretary of the Society of Clinical Surgery, and past President of the Society of University Surgeons. He participates in leadership roles in several other academic surgical organizations, including the Society of Surgical Oncology, the Americas Hepato-Pancreato-Biliary Association and the American Association for the Study of Liver Diseases.
Dr. Tsung earned his medical degree from the SUNY Health Science Center at Brooklyn, then completed his residency in surgery and a fellowship in hepatobiliary and pancreas surgery at the University of Pittsburgh.
Matthew Frigault, M.D.
Dr. Frigault is a medical oncologist in the Hematologic Malignancy Program at the Massachusetts General Hospital Cancer Center, as well as Assistant Director of the Cellular Therapy Service. In addition, he serves as an Instructor at Harvard Medical School. Dr. Frigault recently completed his oncology fellowship at the combined Massachusetts General Hospital/Dana Farber Cancer Institute training program where he worked with Dr. Marcela Maus, head of the Cellular Immunotherapy Program at Massachusetts General Hospital.
Dr. Frigault is responsible for attending on the inpatient bone marrow transplant and leukemia services, managing outpatient cellular therapy patients and overseeing the cellular therapy service in charge of the hospital’s standard of care and clinical research efforts. His current research is focused on the translational aspects of cellular therapies with the goal of developing the next generation of cellular therapies utilizing multi-cistronic lentiviral vectors, CRISPR gene editing and clinical correlatives.
Dr. Frigault’s prior research experience includes preclinical development and correlative studies relevant to T cell immunotherapy in the lab of Dr. Carl June while in graduate school at the University of Pennsylvania. During his post-graduate training at Johns Hopkins, he focused on cellular therapies utilizing marrow infiltrating lymphocytes and chimeric switch receptors in the lab of Dr. Ivan Borrelo.
Dr. Frigault received his Bachelor of Arts degree in Biology and Biological Sciences from the College of the Holy Cross, and his master’s and M.D. degrees from the University of Pennsylvania.
Guenther Koehne, M.D., Ph.D.
Dr. Guenther Koehne is an internationally recognized cancer specialist and current Deputy Director and Chief of Blood & Marrow Transplant and Hematologic Oncology at the Miami Cancer Institute. He has over 30 years of extensive experience in the treatment of leukemia, myelodysplastic syndrome, multiple myeloma and other lymphoproliferative diseases, including with autologous and allogeneic stem cell transplantations. Over the course of his career, he has established a noteworthy reputation for his work in adoptive immunotherapeutic approaches with antigen-specific, donor-derived T lymphocytes in the treatment of viral complications following allogeneic transplants and has developed new approaches to the treatment of patients with high-risk multiple myeloma, minimal residual disease of leukemia and relapsed disease post-allogeneic bone marrow transplantation.
Prior to joining the Miami Cancer Institute, Dr. Koehne served as both the Assistant Professor of Medicine and Associate Professor of Medicine at Weill Cornell Medicine. Prior to that, Dr. Koehne spent over 20 years at the Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center (MSKCC) and held a multitude of roles, including Medical Director of the Cytotherapy Laboratory (Bone Marrow Transplantation Laboratory) and Hematologic Oncologist. While serving as the Medical Director at MSKCC, he established new T cell depletion techniques and other methods to manipulate donor stem cell products that optimize patient outcomes.
Dr. Koehne has served as Principal Investigator or Principal Co-Investigator for a number of clinical trials involving bone marrow transplantation, particularly in the area of multiple myeloma, to study the effectiveness of T cell-depleted transplants from related and unrelated donors in patients with high-risk and relapsed multiple myeloma. He is regarded in the medical community as a pioneer in developing specific donor-derived immune cells (T lymphocytes) to treat both the viral complications of transplantation and disease relapse following transplantation. His developed treatment approach is a type of adoptive immunotherapy and is being administered in several active clinical trials.
A physician-scientist, Dr. Koehne received his M.D. and Ph.D. from Medical University of Hamburg, Germany. He completed his residency in Internal Medicine at Medical University of Hamburg and Rush University Medical Center in Chicago. He completed his medical oncology/hematology fellowship at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, and an additional research fellowship in the Immunology Program at the Sloan Kettering Institute for Cancer Research, Allogeneic Bone Marrow Transplantation Service, where he also served as a research associate.
Maksim Mamonkin, Ph.D.
Dr. Mamonkin is a leading research expert in developing new therapeutic tools to treat hematologic malignancies and solid tumors using adoptive cell therapy. He currently serves as an Assistant Professor in the Center for Cell and Gene Therapy and maintains academic appointment in the Department of Pathology and Immunology at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, Texas. Dr. Mamonkin directs a laboratory that focuses on investigating the mechanisms and effects of CAR signaling in therapeutic T cells and developing new engineered approaches using genome editing and synthetic biology to enhance cell therapy of aggressive hematologic malignancies. He oversees clinical translation of investigational therapies though cGMP manufacturing to the clinic and serves as a co-principal investigator on several ongoing and upcoming clinical trials of CAR T cells in hematologic malignancies at Baylor College of Medicine.
Dr. Mamonkin received his Ph.D. in Immunology at Baylor College of Medicine studying the transcriptional regulation of T-cell differentiation in response to bacterial infection and completed his postdoctoral training with Dr. Malcolm Brenner at the Center for Cell and Gene Therapy, Baylor College of Medicine.