News from the Hale Family Center
Recent News
June 2026
Congratulations to Hale Center investigator and Koch Institute Director, Matthew Vander Heiden, on his appointment as Editor-in-Chief of Cancer Discovery, a journal of the American Association for Cancer Research (AACR). As Editor-in-Chief, Matt will help shape the publication of impactful discoveries spanning basic, translational, and clinical cancer research. To read the official announcement from AACR, click here. Congratulations, Matt!
May 2026
The work of several Hale Center members culminated in the publication of "Gemcitabine and nab-paclitaxel with or without the VDR agonist paricalcitol for metastatic pancreatic cancer: a randomized, multi-arm, run-in phase trial” in the June issue of Nature Cancer. The study, led by Kim Perez, a medical oncologist, and Andressa Dias Costa, a translational scientist in the Wolpin-Nowak Lab, investigated the safety and pharmacodynamic effects of the vitamin D receptor (VDR) agonist paricalcitol, a synthetic vitamin D analog, in treating metastatic pancreatic cancer patients when combined with standard chemotherapy. To learn more, read the news releases from DFCI and the Salk Institute.
May 2026
An experimental pancreatic cancer drug, daraxonrasib, that doubled survival in patients with advanced pancreatic cancer is poised to revolutionize treatment for the disease. Dana-Farber’s Brian Wolpin, director of the Gastrointestinal Cancer Center and the Hale Family Center for Pancreatic Cancer Research as well as the Robert T. and Judith B. Hale Chair in Pancreatic Cancer, recently discussed leading this groundbreaking research with NBC News. “This really feels like a watershed moment,” said Wolpin. “It’s going to shift how we think about treatment for pancreatic cancer overall.”
May 2026
Congratulations to Eli Van Allen who is the recipient of the 2026 AACR-Waun Ki Hong Award for Outstanding Achievement in Translational and Clinical Cancer Research! Eli is being recognized for pioneering discoveries that have advanced precision oncology through the integration of cancer genomics and computational biology to identify molecular determinants of therapeutic response and resistance. Through large-scale tumor sequencing and integrative genomic analyses, Eli's research has defined genomic mechanisms underlying resistance to targeted therapies, including BRAF inhibition in melanoma, and identified genomic features associated with response to immune checkpoint blockade. His work has advanced biomarker discovery and the use of genomic data to guide personalized cancer treatments, as well as bridge advances in artificial intelligence with translational cancer research to impact discovery.
April 2026
Treating pancreatic cancer early, when the response to treatment is optimal, is another top priority of several investigators within the Hale Center. Brandon Huffman was recently awarded a Research Scholar Award from the American Gastroenterological Association to lead a clinical trial of daraxonrasib in the neoadjuvant setting. Congratulations, Brandon!
March 2026
Matt Vander Heiden was elected to the Fellows of AACR Academy Class of 2026. Matt was recognized for contributions to innovative strategies for early cancer detection, targeted therapy and precision oncology.
March 2026
Congratulations also go to Will-Freed Pastor for his role on the Cancer Grand Challenges ILLUMINE team. The Cancer Grand Challenges, co-founded by CRUK and the NCI, bring together global, interdisciplinary teams of researchers to take on the most challenging problems in cancer research, leveraging their combined expertise and agile strategies to make the greatest impact.
Recent data indicate that cancer cells express proteins that are not derived from known open reading frames. The origins of this ‘dark proteome’ remain elusive. Team ILLUMINE aims to unlock the potential of the cancer dark proteome to uncover novel, potentially universal tumor antigens and develop innovative immunotherapies for hard-to-treat cancers. Click here to learn more.
January 2026
Will Freed-Pastor was named one of the 2026 AACR Nextgen Stars and was invited to give a talk, "Cancer-restricted cryptic antigens: Novel target for next-generation T cell-based therapies" at AACR's Annual Meeting in April.
Will was also named one of the American Cancer Society's Yosemite Award recipients for his work on catalyzing cryptic antigen-directed vaccines for pancreatic cancer. This award supports research focused around cancer vaccines and cancer-targeted toxins.
Read more about the recipients and their work.
December 2025
"Curiosity and Compassion Fuel Wolpin's Drive to Advance GI Cancer Research"
OncLive's December feature discussed how Brian Wolpin's passion for science, patient care, and collaborative research has helped Dana-Farber and the Hale Center develop new strategies in early detection and therapy resistance in pancreatic cancer.
December 2025
"Eleven clinical trials that will shape medicine in 2026"
Nature Medicine named the phase III clinical trial of daraxonrasib, Revolution Medicine’s RAS(ON) inhibitor, currently in trials for the treatment of metastatic PDAC, one of the 11 clinical trials that will shape medicine in 2026. The trial, led by Brian Wolpin in collaboration with other investigators within the Hale Center and 60 nationally and internationally-based cancer centers, will evaluate the efficacy of this promising therapeutic in extending progression-free and overall survival in patients with advanced PDAC carrying the most common mutations in KRAS.
November 2025
The Detroit News spotlighted Revolution Medicine's promising experimental cancer drug, daraxonrasib. Brian Wolpin and members of the Hale Center have high hopes that this could be the "turning point" and the "foundation on which we can really build effective treatments."
November 2025
Will-Freed Pastor, together with Megan Insco, organized the 2025 DFCI Molecular and Cellular Oncology Division Retreat held at the Hyatt Regency Boston/Cambridge, where the Hale Center was well represented. Scientific presentations included “Defining, modeling and targeting cell state” led by Sri Raghavan and Evelyn Tong, in addition to work from Brian Wolpin’s team including “Emerging clinical data for RAS inhibitors in patients with metastatic pancreatic cancer” presented by Brandon Huffman.
October 2025
Stephanie Dougan provided expert analysis to NBC News on research presented at the 2025 European Society for Medical Oncology Congress showing that COVID vaccines may have the added benefit of boosting the immune system's ability to fight cancer.
Read the full story by NBC NEWS.
September 2025
Members of the Hale Center attended the 2025 AACR Special Conference in Cancer Research: Advances in Pancreatic Cancer Research—Emerging Science Driving Transformative Solutions. Brian Wolpin gave the keynote address on new methods for early detection and interception of PDAC, Andy Aguirre, co-chair of the conference, presented how the biology of pancreatic cancer is leading to new treatments, and Will Freed-Pastor presented work on novel targets for TCR-based therapies. Julien Dilly and Josh Choe delivered lightning talks on cutting-edge RAS pathway and EMT resistance research.
July 2025
Congratulations to Sri Raghavan, who was awarded a Damon-Runyon Award for his project, “Defining and targeting transcriptional drivers of KRAS inhibitor resistance in pancreatic cancer.”
Read more about it in the full announcement.
June 2025
Congratulations to the Freed-Pastor Lab who recently published “Pancreatic cancer-restricted cryptic antigens are targets for T cell recognition” in Science.
Read more about the lab’s innovative work on cryptic peptides at MIT News.
May 2025
Congratulations to Dan Gui, a clinical and postdoctoral fellow in medical oncology, for being selected as a 2025 Lubin Family Foundation Scholar. Dan will be co-mentored by Andy Aguirre and Eliezer Van Allen. Dan’s research focuses on unraveling the mechanisms behind treatment resistance in pancreatic cancer, with a particular emphasis on non-genetic mechanisms of resistance.
Read more about this prestigious award.
May 2025
Brian Wolpin was inducted into the 13th Annual Class of the Giants of Cancer Care presented by OncLive. This honor recognizes oncology leaders for groundbreaking research and clinical practice, selected by a committee of over 115 oncologists.
March 2025
Michael Rosenthal participated on an expert panel, “Revolutionizing Healthcare – Specialty Spotlight: AI in Oncology” at the University of Cambridge in the UK. Using a low-cost, low-risk AI-driven method, his group is drawing from electronic medical record (EMR) data, opportunistic image analysis, and blood tests to identify high-risk groups within the general population who would benefit most from active screening.
Watch the video of Michael’s presentation.
February 2025
Will Freed-Pastor was awarded a 2025 American Society for Clinical Investigation Young Physician-Scientist Award, which recognizes physician-scientists who have made notable achievements in their research.
Read more about Will’s recognition by the American Society for Clinical Investigation.
News Archive
December 2024
Joe Mancias led the December Hale Center Monthly meeting which included updates to Hale PRA II: “Defining PDAC precursor lesion biology to advance early cancer detection and intervention.” Jonathan Nowak, MattVander Heiden and Katie Aney from Sahar Nissim’s Lab provided updates to complementary, ongoing work to understand why the majority of PDAC arises from PanIN but the majority of PanIN do not progress to PDAC.
December 2024
On December 17th, DFCI President and CEO Ben Ebert announced the launch of the Dana-Farber Center for RAS Therapeutics, which will focus on targeting the RAS oncogene in cancer. The Center will be co-directed by Alice Shaw, MD, PhD, a thoracic medical oncologist, and Andrew Aguirre, MD, PhD of the Hale Center, both of whom presented at the DFCI open forum on December 18th. Andy highlighted collaborative efforts across the institute to achieve the mission of the Center: Through scientific discovery, translational research, and clinical investigations, the DFCI Center for RAS Therapeutics will advance novel treatment approaches to transform the lives of patients with RAS-driven cancers.
November 2024
The Hale Center had a strong presence at the 2024 Break Through Cancer (BTC) Summit held in Houston, Texas. Will Freed-Pastor and Stephanie Dougan presented updates to the Demystifying Pancreatic Cancer Therapies Project, and Jonathan Nowak provided findings from the Conquering KRAS Project. Lauren Brais, pictured below, was the recipient of the 2024 Livingston Award for her exceptional project management support.
September 2024
Sahar Nissim received the 2024 Rising Star Award from the National Pancreas Foundation. This award recognized the Nissim Lab's work in defining signaling and epigenetic determinants of pancreatic cancer precursors in order to pioneer strategies for interception. Congratulations, Sahar!