Sam W Lee

Hi, I am Sam W Lee. I am a cancer biologist at Massachusetts General Hospital and also a Professor at Harvard Medical School in Boston, Massachusetts.

Sam W Lee: Since my years as a Harvard faculty member, I have focused a sustained effort toward cancer biology, and my initial most significant contribution was the first to discover that pro-survival pathway activation is directly associated with p53-dependent genotoxic responses in cancer cells, and have provided a unique and significant contribution in this area. As an Assistant and then as an Associate Professor at the BIDMC and the MGH/Harvard Medical School, I pursued my major interest in how tumor suppressor p53-mediated transcriptional regulation influences cell fate decisions: live or die. Based on my contribution concerning the dark side of p53 in cancer therapeutics that wt-p53 can function as a guardian of cancer genome for their survival against therapeutic stress, I have established close collaborations with the Broad Institute utilizing their technological, computational and chemical biological tools under their Chemical Genetics Platform. Together with Broad scientists, I have identified several promising small molecules with anti-cancer activity through the activation of tumor suppressor p53 apoptotic pathway. Specifically, we have identified a small molecule to induce apoptosis selectively in cells having a cancer genotype by targeting a non-oncogene co-dependency acquired by the expression of the cancer genotype in response to transformation-induced oxidative stress. This highlights a novel strategy for cancer therapy that preferentially eradicates cancer cells by targeting the ROS stress-response pathway. My experience in this area has played a major role in the development of a Chemical Genetics Core facility at CBRC in collaboration with the Broad Institute. My group now possesses considerable experience in systematic small molecule technologies. I will continue to assist with the design, validation, execution and interpretation of investigator initiated chemical genetic screens.

Professor at Harvard Medical School

1989 - Present | Cambridge, MA

Assistant Professor at University of Michigan Medical School

1988 - 1989 | Ann Harbor, Michigan

Division of Cancer Biology

University of California- Berkeley

1984 – 1988

Ph.D.

Concentration: Molecular Genetics