SOTA 02:
Hematopoietic Stem Cell Transplantation
Chairs
Wing Au
After graduation from the HKU in 1992 with honors, Dr Au served in University Medical Unit for 18 years with the Division of hematology, oncology and marrow transplantation. He did sabbaticals at Stanford, Edinburgh and Vancouver. His wide range of academic interests included epidemiology of blood cancers, oral arsenic therapy, stem cell transplantation long-term complications and donor safety, thalassemia and hemophilia management, G6PD and folate metabolism, with over 350 publications since 1997. He co-directs the International Oral Arsenic Union and sits on the Steering committee of the NIH/NCI Asialymph Consortium. He is an invited member of the FLIPI and ITCL lymphoma studies. Dr Au served as Chairman of the HK Society of Hematology, and is a council member of HK Society of Transplantation.
Michael Barnett
Dr. Barnett trained in Medical Oncology at St. Bartholomew’s Hospital in London, England before joining the Leukemia/Bone Marrow Transplant Program of British Columbia, Canada in 1986. He served as Director from 1996 to 2001. After spending two years back at St. Bartholomew’s as Professor of Transplantation Oncology, he returned to Vancouver in 2003 as Head of the Division of Hematology at the University of British Columbia. Dr. Barnett spends his professional time overseeing activities of the Division and treating patients with hematological malignancies. He has a particular interest in the myeloid leukemias.
Speakers
Guy Sauvageau
Guy Sauvageau is the CEO and founding scientific director of the Institute for Research in Immunology and Cancer (IRIC) in Montreal where he is heading the Molecular Genetics Stem Cells Laboratory. Beside his dedication to fundamental research, he is also a clinician-scientist specializing in bone marrow transplantation, scientific director of the Leukemia Cell Bank of Québec and Professor of medicine at Université de Montréal.
His work revealed the importance of developmental genes of the Hox and Pbx families in the regulation of hematopoiesis and their role in leukemia. He also pioneered studies which demonstrated the critical function of several Polycomb group (PcG) genes such as Bmi1 and Eed in self-renewal divisions of normal and leukemia stem cells. Several of Dr. Sauvageau’s findings are now in the arena of hit identification or optimization for anti-cancer treatments or stem cell expansion, respectively. Of these, the TAT-HOXB4 fusion protein is very promising as it can efficiently penetrate the cellular and nuclear membrane of target HSC and be used as a “growth factor” for these cells. Guy Sauvageau is the leader of the CIHR team grant on HSC expansion, which includes an integrated group of international investigators who are developing new reagents, tools and protocols to initiate phase I clinical trials using this recombinant protein to expand hematopoietic stem cells exvivo. In recognition of his work, Guy Sauvageau received several national and international awards, such as the Till and McCulloch Award from the International Society of Experimental Hematology (2006), the Stohlman Scholar from the LLSA (2007) and Till and McCulloch Award from the Canadian Stem Cell Network (2009). He holds the Canada Research Chair in the Molecular Genetics of Stem Cells and was recently appointed fellow of the Canadian Academy of Health Sciences.
Clayton Smith
Bio coming soon.
Joachim Deeg
Dr. Deeg is Professor of Medicine at the University of Washington, and a Full Member of the Clinical Research Division at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center (FHCRC) in Seattle, WA.
He earned his medical degree at the University of Bonn, Germany, completed his internal medicine training and was Chief Medical Resident at the University of Rochester School of Medicine, Rochester, N.Y, and did his Hematology/Oncology fellowship under E.D.Thomas at the University of Washington, Seattle, where he then joined the faculty. In 1986 Dr. Deeg established the Marrow Transplantation Program at Georgetown University in Washington D.C., and subsequently served as Director of the Immunology Laboratory at VGH, University of British Columbia,Vancouver before returning to his current position at the FHCRC in Seattle.
Dr Deeg has worked and published extensively on transplantation biology, GVHD, the pathophysiology and therapy of the myelodysplastic syndromes, late complications of cancer therapy and related questions. He developed the cyclosporine plus methotrexate regimen for GVHD prophylaxis that has been used worldwide. He is the recipient of the Alexander von Humboldt Research Award, he presented the Till and McCullough Lecture at the 11th Biennial CBMTG Conference (2008) in Montreal, and recently was recognized with the “Leadership in Science 2008” award by the Aplastic Anemia and MDS International Foundation. He has served on several NMDPand ASBMT committees, the Committee on Transplantation Biology of ASH, and is a member of the Myelodysplasia Panel of the National Comprehensive Cancer Center Network of the NCI. He has served on numerous editorial boards, including Blood, Leukemia and Biology of Blood and Marrow Transplantation among others.