Title(s): Assistant Professor
Department: Epidemiology
Office: S451 CPHB
Phone: (319) 384-1560
Social: Twitter feed

I was appointed as an assistant professor to the College of Public Health at the University of Iowa in August 2018. My main research focus is cancer epidemiology, and molecular cancer epidemiology which relates etiologic exposures to cancer subtypes defined by molecular and or pathological characteristics.

My current research at the University of Iowa has a heavy focus on rare tumors and subgroups, including neuroendocrine tumors (NETs). I received funding in 2021 from PCORI to engage some 2,500 NET patients and stakeholders in the conduct of a nationwide prospective cohort study (NET-PRO) across 14 clinical sites, answering comparative effectiveness research questions and, optimizing the effectiveness and sequencing of therapy for NET patients. Allied to this project, I’m a co-I and Co-Director of the Biospecimens Core in the newly funded Specialized Program of Research Excellence (SPORE) in carcinoid and neuroendocrine tumors.

Other research efforts at the University of Iowa relate to my work as PI on the Iowa SEER residual and virtual tissue repositories (RTR and VTR), which supports many important population-based cancer studies leveraging FFPE tissue resources. I am delighted to have the continued support and mentorship from professor emeritus Dr. Charles Lynch in support of this effort. In this role I work very closely with a wider team including Dr Marcus Nashelsky (our Iowa cancer Registry medical director and resident anatomic pathologist), and Freda Selk (our tissue coordinator). With this skilled team, I have general oversight of all project execution, assist with technical protocol development to guide workflows and budgets, and obtain local IRB approvals and any requisite data sharing agreements/MTAs.

Outside the NETs realm, I have internal seed funding for two molecular epidemiology projects (in breast and colon cancer) leveraging residual diagnostic tissue from the Iowa Cancer Registry. I’ve also collaborations with a surgical and immunology core at UIowa (PI: Jon Houtman) on a P3 project to obtain preliminary data that will enable the development of a NCI P50 SPORE grant or a new NCI P01 program project grant in lung cancer. I also collaborate on a population science project (Co-PI with Dr Benjamin Miller) for a NIH P50 Sarcoma Spore project being led by Dr. Munir Tanas.