Chair's Message Archive - 2023

June 2023 - Research Updates & Graduates

The Department of Pathology & Laboratory Medicine is an integral part of the vibrant UCLA research enterprise and includes faculty members with a broad array of basic, translational, and clinical research interests.

RESEARCH & CLINICAL EXCELLENCE DAY

Our second annual Research and Clinical Excellence Day was held on Friday, May 26, 2023. The event highlighted the ongoing basic, translational and clinical research in our department including quality, lab stewardship and education research. The event included presentations and over 20 poster displays. Thank you to our speakers, Drs. Charisse Treece, Yazhen Zhu, Dinesh Rao, Fausto Rodriguez, Ting Zhang, Nicole Valenzuela, and our keynote speaker, Dr. Gay Crooks. 

The poster presentations were equally diverse. Thank you all who participated - over double from last year!

I’d also like to thank the Research Day Committee, Drs. Jonathan Said (Chair), Tom Lee, Neda Moatamed, Bogdan Pasaniuc, and Jasmine Zhou for their vision in creating a platform to showcase department research.

Save the Date! Our third annual Research and Clinical Excellence Day will be held on Friday, May 31, 2024. As you and your team present research in the upcoming year, please remember that we would love to have you present your work at our event.

RESEARCH AWARDS

I am proud to profile our new research awards as of July 1st. We congratulate the faculty principal investigators on their grant awards and look forward to their innovative findings and results. 

The publications, grants and collaborations by our faculty underscore that UCLA is a highly interactive and collaborative environment in which interdisciplinary research flourishes. Our faculty and students continue to conduct important and meaningful basic, translational and clinical research and I look forward to learning about their future discoveries. Departmental research has continued to thrive and grow over the past decade. Our faculty publish their findings in many of the top biomedical journals such as Cell, Nature, Immunity, Molecular Cell, Nature Immunology, and the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

To date for FY23, faculty researchers generated over $4.8 million in active extramural funding, including over $1.7 million from NIH. This is double the amount of new funding compared to the same time period for last year – congratulations to all and thank you for all the grants submitted!

GRADUATING STAFF & CLINICAL TRAINEES   

As the academic year comes to a close, I would like to spotlight our graduating trainees, including staff and clinical MD/PhD trainees. We thank them for their dedication and wish them the best in their future endeavors.

STAFF & OTHER TRAINEES

Cytogenetics Training Program - Jennifer Tolosa 

Clinical Genetic Molecular Biologist Scientist (CGMBS) Program - Linh Lam

School of Cytology
Sharleen Decano, Vanessa Moy, Guangzhu Zhang, Jun Zhao

 

PA Students
Elaine Hunter & Alexander Knoester

CLINICAL TRAINEES

Please view a list of our Clinical Trainees and their future endeavors.

POST DOCS

Please view a list of our Post Docs and their future endeavors.

May 2023 - Microbiology Updates

The Clinical Microbiology Lab has recently developed and launched 3 new clinical tests. These tests target recent outbreaks of emerging infections and organisms that are very difficult to perform susceptibility testing.

• In response to the recent mpox outbreak, the UCLA Clinical Microbiology lab developed and launched an mpox PCR for clinical diagnosis. We were one of the first UC labs to have the test available in-house. This test helped support the quick response to this new emerging disease.
• Klebsiella pneumoniae (a gram-negative enteric bacteria) can cause devastating systemic infection if they exhibit a "hypervirulent" phenotype. Early recognition of hypervirulence can allow for a change in clinical care and better outcomes for patients. There are very few reliable tests in the clinical lab that can recognize hypervirulence in Klebsiella pneumoniae isolates. We have developed and launched a whole genome sequencing assay that can reliably identify the hypervirulence phenotype by looking for the presence of bacterial genes associated with hypervirulence. The test has already identified numerous hypervirulent klebsiella strains from patients and had a positive impact on their care.
• Susceptibility testing for Mycobacterium tuberculosis (MTB) is important because multi-drug resistant strains are becoming more prevalent in the United States. Phenotypic susceptibility testing can take 3-5 weeks after organism identification, causing delays in appropriate therapy. We have developed and launched an MTB whole genome sequencing anti-microbial resistance test that is able to provide results in 1 week after organism identification. This test represents a new gold-standard in TB testing.

The Clinical Microbiology Lab has recently developed and launched 3 new clinical tests. These tests target recent outbreaks of emerging infections and organisms that are very difficult to perform susceptibility testing.

• In response to the recent mpox outbreak, the UCLA Clinical Microbiology lab developed and launched an mpox PCR for clinical diagnosis. We were one of the first UC labs to have the test available in-house. This test helped support the quick response to this new emerging disease.
• Klebsiella pneumoniae (a gram-negative enteric bacteria) can cause devastating systemic infection if they exhibit a "hypervirulent" phenotype. Early recognition of hypervirulence can allow for a change in clinical care and better outcomes for patients. There are very few reliable tests in the clinical lab that can recognize hypervirulence in Klebsiella pneumoniae isolates. We have developed and launched a whole genome sequencing assay that can reliably identify the hypervirulence phenotype by looking for the presence of bacterial genes associated with hypervirulence. The test has already identified numerous hypervirulent klebsiella strains from patients and had a positive impact on their care.
• Susceptibility testing for Mycobacterium tuberculosis (MTB) is important because multi-drug resistant strains are becoming more prevalent in the United States. Phenotypic susceptibility testing can take 3-5 weeks after organism identification, causing delays in appropriate therapy. We have developed and launched an MTB whole genome sequencing anti-microbial resistance test that is able to provide results in 1 week after organism identification. This test represents a new gold-standard in TB testing.

April 2023 - EDI Related Research

In addition to our Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion (EDI) Committee, our department also supports EDI within our research activities. I would like to spotlight our ongoing efforts to forward EDI in the research arenas.

ANATOMIC PATHOLOGY

Dr. Neda Moatamed, Dr. Sarah Zhang, Dr. Erika Rodriguez, et al

Title: Clinical history of female-to-male transgender patients is needed to avoid misinterpretation of cervical Papanicolaou tests.

Cervical cancer screening is as important in female-to-male transgender (FTMT) individuals as it is in cisgender female patients. This study has examined the impact of clinical information regarding gender identity and testosterone therapy on the cytological interpretations. The findings indicate that clinical information regarding whether a subject is a FTM and/or is receiving testosterone therapy is crucial to avoiding Pap test overcalls.

This retrospective study was performed By Neda A. Moatamed, Adriana Del Barco, Stephanie Yang ,Yong Ying, Sarah Zhang, and Erika Rodriguez . After publishing the article, Dr. Sarah Zhang and Mary Levin have continued and worked closely with Beaker team on the quality improvement of the project. They introduced a system of automated flagging of the cervical Pap test of the cases who are identified as male at the time of accessioning by notification  at the time of signing out.  This feature can reduce the number of atypical Pap tests.

Dr. Erika Rodriguez, Dr. Precious Fortes, Dr. Neda Moatamed, Dr. Jitin Makker

Assessing Racial/Ethnic Disparities in Cervical Cancer: Prevalence of Co-Infection by Multiple HPV Genotypes and Cytologic Diagnoses (data collection phase).

Objectives: We aim to retrieve and analyze HPV results focusing on HPV co-infections and cytology and biopsy reports to evaluate racial and sociodemographic differences in HPV vaccination status and compare the risk of cervical lesions on those patients.

Specific Aims:

1. Compare HPV testing, HPV co-infections and cytology results between different racial/ethnic groups and evaluate for disparities that may exist 
2. Determine the incidence of HPV co-infection in our UCLA population
3. Evaluate the association between HPV co-infection and follow up for screening
4. Determine if patients with HPV co-infection are at a higher risk of cervical lesions

LABORATORY MEDICINE

Dr. Omai Garner

• Multi-institutional project to develop Point of Care Cardiac and Diabetes tests for underserved populations in the US. This project is developing new point of care platforms based on cell phones and implantable monitoring devices.
• A Global Health project with colleagues in the Gambia and Kenya to extend clinical microbiology testing capability. The project also includes colleagues at UCLA from infection prevention to bring best practices in clinical testing and infection prevention to low/middle income countries.

UIC 

Dr. Elaine F. Reed

• They are collaborating with CEAL leaders Keith Norris and Arlene Brown entitled “Share, Trust, Organize, Partner: The COVID-19 California Alliance (STOP COVID-19 CA) Phase 3"
  • Subtitle: LA-SPARTA Synergy Operation COVID-19 (LASSO COVID-19)
  • Purpose: To advance mutual goals and synergistic opportunities for CEAL / STOP COVID-19 and LA-SPARTA with a focus on at-risk and underserved south LA populations disproportionately impacted by this pandemic.  A translational purpose of this initiative is to enhance personal and public health education to promote improved outcomes in underserved persons at highest risks of exposure and greatest vaccine hesitancy.
• In collaboration with Michael Yeaman at the Lundquist Institute, Harbor-UCLA they identified differences in male vs female outcomes in our experimental model of MRSA bacteremia.  Our submitted U19 grant application focuses in part on defining host sex contexts that drive immune protection against exploitation by MRSA. 
• Their funded research in ischemia reperfusion injury, immune signatures of CMV and COVID-19 infection explore the impact of age, race, sex as predictors of outcome.
• Elaine F. Reed, in collaboration with the Women in Transplantation, has published a manuscript with Frontiers Immunology.
  • Mannon RB, Reed EF, Melk A, Vinson A, Wong G, Ahn C, Davidson B, Foster B, West LJ, Tait K, Chong AS. A multi-faceted approach to sex and gender equity in solid organ transplantation: The Women in Transplantation Initiative of The Transplantation Society. Front Immunol. PMID: 36263043; PMCID: PMC9575514.

Dr. Nicole Valenzuela

• In R&D, they have two projects that are related to health equity:
  • Assess utility of extended panels for detecting novel HLA antibodies and eplet reactivity in non-European patients and detecting donor specificity to non-European donor alleles.
  • Evaluate different methods of HLA eplet molecular mismatch calculation in diverse patient populations, with an emphasis on inclusion of non-European patient-donor pairs for the accuracy of imputation.

Dr. Carrie Butler

• Dr. Butler is part of the HLA Dictionary Update subcommittee of ASHI and has an abstract for an oral presentation accepted at the 2022 ASHI Annual Meeting and the publication is currently in preparation. The HLA Dictionary 2022 dataset will aid in improved registry search algorithms and risk assessment of more diverse populations. The abstract title and authors are listed below:
  • HLA Dictionary 2022 - Updated Serologic Prediction Models Based on Paired DNA-Serology Assignments from NMDP Registry Typing Data. Biagini₁, ₂, L. Gragert_{1, 2}, , M. Maiers₃, M. Milsten₃, J. Kempenich₃, E. Beduhn₃, S. Marsh₄, J. Robinson₄, M. Askar_{5, 6}, J. Houp₇, M. Coppage₈, C. Butler₉, ₁₀, A.F. Locke₉, R. Liwski₁₁, M. Gautreaux_{12, 13}

Dr. Rebecca Sosa

• Dr. Sosa is currently serving as moderator for this year’s EDI Book/Journal Club, with the goal of highlighting the importance of diversity in science. The Club recently met to watch and discuss the film Picture A Scientist together on February 3rd, 2023, as well as distributed licenses for virtual viewing. The in-person viewing was prefaced with a powerful presentation on the current state of women in science by keynote speaker, Dr. Elaine Reed. Following the viewing the audience was split into breakout sessions with topic-specific focus groups and a broader audience-wide discussion. Participants provided excellent feedback on how the department can better provide opportunities for growth regarding diversity in science.

RESEARCH FACULTY  

Dr. Bogdan Pasaniuc

New Biomedical Data Science Training Program Focuses on Precision Health Equity

UCLA’s Institute for Precision Health and the Department of Computational Medicine have launched a new training program for predoctoral and postdoctoral trainees to foster a diverse, interdisciplinary environment to learn to invent and develop computational approaches and tools to deliver on the promise of precision health for everyone.

Led by Drs. Bogdan Pasaniuc and Alex Bui, the program includes faculty that cover a broad spectrum of biomedical informatics and data science research and represent 14 primary home departments from the Schools of Medicine, Engineering & Applied Sciences and Public Health; and the College of Letters & Science. Full article here.

UCLA Health Receives $4.8M NIH Grant to Improve Genetic Estimates of Disease Risk in Diverse Populations

UCLA Health will receive a $4.8 million grant from The National Institutes of Health to develop methods that will improve genetic risk estimates – polygenic risk scores – for specific diseases in people from diverse populations and mixed ancestries.

The NIH funding comes from grants provided by the National Human Genome Research Institute (NHGRI) and the National Cancer Institute (NCI) to establish a multi-center research consortium that will pool genomic information from existing and new datasets. The researchers will then develop and evaluate methods for calculating polygenic risk scores (PRS) with an emphasis on studying people from different ancestries. Each research center may include several collaborating institutions. Full article here.

UCLA Health Researchers Analyze LA’s ‘Stunningly Diverse’ Genetic Ancestry to Bring Ethnic Equity to Precision Medicine

Analyzing genetic ancestry data from a large genomic repository – the UCLA ATLAS Precision Health Biobank – researchers have found a highly diverse patient population that’s consistent with the global diversity of Los Angeles – one of the most ethnically diverse cities in the world and an ideal location to pursue personalized, precision medicine for underrepresented populations. Full article here.

Session of the Pacific Symposium of Bioinformatics

This session of the Pacific Symposium on Biocomputing aims to highlight new analyses, methods, algorithms or datasets that can be applied across the continuum from research to translation to overcome disparities in precision medicine. More here.  

Other Publications:

• The UCLA ATLAS Community Health Initiative: Promoting Precision Health Research in a Diverse Biobank
• Leveraging Genomic Diversity for Discovery in an Electronic Health Record Linked Biobank: the UCLA ATLAS Community Health Initiative

March 2023 - Staff Recognition & Community Service

This month, I would like to spotlight our monthly Staff Recognition Program. We thank these amazing individuals for their hard work, for their dedication to our patients, our clinicians, our students/trainees, our faculty and to their team, for the outstanding quality of their work and for their consistently helpful and positive outlook.

We are fortunate to have so many dedicated staff members and such wonderful teams, all focused on our vision, which is, “We are committed to healing humankind, one patient at a time, by delivering outstanding clinical laboratory services, advancing research, educating the next generation, doing what’s right, making things better and being kind.”

Below, I’m delighted to spotlight a few of the many ways members of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine are giving back to our communities and I’m happy to recognize our employees of the month for the past year.

2022 DGSOM Employees of the Month

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

2022 AP Employees of the Month

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

2022 LM Employees of the Month

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

CORE LAB

In early 2022, Ronald Reagan Point of Care team, led by Lavita Boyd, and QA Sr. Specialists Lilian Baldwin and Khanh Andrews, sprang into action on the first day back from the holidays and set up COVID antigen testing in the 100 Medical Plaza building by January 4th. Nurses from Hospital Quality were trained to perform testing, and job aids and supplies were provided by RR Lab team. Over 600 staff were screened by the time testing wrapped up a month later.

CARE HARBOR CLINIC

• On March 4-6, The Care Harbor Free Health Clinic hosted their annual health fair that provides free medical, dental and vision care to thousands of uninsured and underinsured people in our communities. For those who live without access to the care they need, this is a destination for help and hope. I am proud to share our department played a key role in the success of this event, as we have since 2011.
• Under the direction of Lavita Boyd, our team analyzed results for tests orders, including Wet mounts, Hemoglobin, Urine pregnancy, and Urine Dipstick. I would like to spotlight all our department volunteers: Lavita Boyd, Vladimyria C. Aquino, Candie Bautista, Ofelia Cartagena, Claire Ladan, Anna Marie Ramos, JooHee Sohn, Sonia Valadez, Emylee Villasin, and Charlene Yu.
• This event is an important way that we give back to our community and I am so grateful to our volunteers for their time and dedication to ensure the lab testing proceeded smoothly.
• Please see our event flyer for additional information and pictures of our team in action! To view the video from the UCLA Newsroom, please visit here.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

HEART WALK

For the 13th consecutive year, Pathology & Laboratory Medicine fielded a team for the American Heart & Stroke Association's Heart Walk, which took place on Saturday, October 22, 2022 at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum. Led by Nathan Okawa, our team placed third out of 51 UCLA teams, surpassing our fundraising goal and raising $6260. UCLA Health also surpassed their goal and raised over $80,000, the most of all participating hospitals.

 

 

 

 

 

BLOOD & PLATELET CENTER (BPC)

• International WeLoveU Foundation Blood Drive with UCLA Blood & Platelet Center (BPC) In 2022, the BPC, WSS, WeLoveU Foundation, the Dodgers, and two blood donor centers partnered for a community blood drive at the Dodger Stadium. With a combined total of 583 donors, an unprecedented 469 Whole Blood units were collected. This number is even more impressive given the nationwide blood inventory shortage being experienced at the time. Such massive collection not only fulfilled our hospital patient transfusion needs, it enabled us to share blood products to other UC Medical Centers and neighboring hospitals.
• Resumed high school blood drives on-site while adhering to COVID guidelines.
• Resumed the Turner Internship Program during Summer 2022.
• BPC was selected as a capstone project by the Anderson School of Management, Applied Management Research Program. The AMR team will provide strategic feedback for the BPC in an effort to maximize our operations and develop a model for other hospital-based donor centers.

BRENTWOOD

• Continue C. auris testing, providing support to long term care facilities and the community.
• Surpassed over 660,000 COVID PCR tests performed since the beginning of the pandemic.
• Several UCLA staff who work in Brentwood are board members of SCASM (Southern California Branch of the American Society for Microbiology), see below.
  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

February 2023 - Hub of the Hospital

QUALITY PROGRAM UPDATES

WELCOME

In July 2022, we welcomed Monique Trinh as Quality Program Project Manager. Monique is an extremely engaged team member with strong analytic, project management and people skills. She is also currently enrolled at the UCLA Fielding School of Public Health, where she is pursuing her Master of Healthcare Administration (expected to graduate June 2023). Since joining us, Monique has been instrumental in advancing QI project management throughout the department.

 

 

 

 

 

 

I am so delighted by the great strides we have taken in our quality activities over the past two years! I would like to thank and recognize our leaders who have worked tirelessly on expanding our activities and on improving the quality of our quality program:

 

 

 

 

 

Dr. Michelle Hickey, Director, Pathology and Laboratory Medicine Quality Improvement Program & Chair of the Quality Leadership Committee

 

 

 

 

 

 

Dr. Yuna Kang, Chair of the Quality Culture/Education/Resident Projects Committee

 

 

 

 

 

Dr. Alyssa Ziman, Co-Chair of the Quality Utilization and Improvement Committee

 

 

 

 

 

 

Alexander Martin, PA(ASCP), MHA, Co-Chair of the Quality Utilization and Improvement Committee

2023 QUALITY IMPROVEMENT DAY AND DALJIT S. AND ELAINE SARKARIA KEYNOTE LECTURE ON QUALITY IMPROVEMENT

Please join us for the 2023 Quality Improvement Day and Daljit S. and Elaine Sarkaria Keynote Lecture on Quality Improvement, which will be hosted virtually via Zoom from 8 a.m. to 1 p.m. on 2/10/2023. Our keynote speaker is Kate Hilton from the Institute for Healthcare Improvement. Quality Improvement Day will also feature DGSOM faculty, DGSOM trainees, and other clinicians. Detailed information about the agenda and speakers can be found on the website we created for the program. If you can join, please register here.

 

 

 

 

 

 

PATHOLOGY – HUB OF THE HOSPITAL

This year, we had a goal to broaden our QI footprint and partner with other Health System QI teams to improve diagnostics, operations and patient safety. Therefore, we added a new committee to our QI Program structure - the Quality Leadership Committee (QLC). The QLC was established to identify cross-departmental projects in alignment with UCLA Health, FPG, and DGSOM quality goals. In essence, Pathology and Laboratory Medicine is the hub of the hospital as samples from almost every patient seen in the hospital pass through the laboratory.

Since the specimens received are from patients from every clinical department, we think it’s important to partner with other clinical departments in quality improvement efforts. Thus, our strategic pillars at large are to:

• Increase partnerships with key stakeholders systemwide.
• Transcend silos and foster interdisciplinary collaboration through continuous quality improvement.
• Strengthen internal operations with refinement & alignment.
• Optimize efficiencies (patient safety, operations and workflow improvements, or increase cost-savings).

 

 

 

 

 

 

CURRENT PROJECTS

We have identified four projects to support this fiscal year:

1. Develop test order pathways for the first diagnosis of multiple sclerosis

This project is led by Dr. Michelle Hickey (Immunogenetics) and Dr. Melle Reider-Demer (Neurology). The project team consists of Dr. Michelle Hickey (Immunogenetics), Dr. Melle Reider-Demer (Neurology), and Dr. Kevin Patel (Neurology). Together, they are working to develop standard test order pathways for the first diagnosis of Multiple Sclerosis. The project endeavors to enhance patient safety and quality, improve access to care, and ensure financial sustainability. The Department is providing project management and data analysis support to achieve the following goals:

• (a) Retrospective review of test/scan utilization in first diagnosis of MS to create test ordering pathway.
• (b) Work with key stakeholders to refine test ordering pathway and create an educational process for training faculty/staff/trainees.
• (c) Evaluate impact.

2. Improving discrete reporting of clinical/diagnostic data for transplant patients

This project is led by Dr. Michelle Hickey (Immunogenetics). The project team consists of Dr. Michelle Hickey (Immunogenetics), Dr. John Zuckerman (AP), Dr. Jitin Makker (AP), and Dr. Erik Lum (Nephrology). Together, they are developing a dashboard to efficiently synthesize and analyze quality assessment information. The project endeavors to enhance patient safety and quality. The Department is providing project management and informatics support to achieve the following goals:

• (a) Improve clinical ordering of appropriate serum testing at the time of renal biopsy (to comply with current national guidelines).
• (b) Create a Tableau dashboard of data for patient management and QA needs.

3. Increase blood culture fill volumes

This project is led by Dr. Omai Garner (LM) and Allison Nomura (LM). The project team consists of Jennifer Zhang and Jonathan Aquino. Together, they are working to develop methodologies to increase blood fill volumes, increasing the accuracy of sepsis diagnosis. The project endeavors to enhance patient safety and quality, improve access to care, and ensure financial sustainability. The Department is championing the project with leadership, providing financial support for additional staffing for additional data collection, project management, and informatics support to achieve the following goals:

• (a) Improve data collection to improve data from our middleware.
• (b) Interventions – a. physically mark blood collection bottles with “fill line”; b. targeted education to providers who are consistently collecting low blood volumes.
• (c) Education – general education and onboarding education.
• (d) Consistent, constant feedback to providers regarding the blood volumes they are collecting.

4. Reference lab optimizations 

This project is led by William Werre (LM), Alex Martin (AP), Marivic Visico, Dr. Josh Deignan (AP), and Dr. Alyssa Ziman (LM). The project team consists of the Lab Stewardship Task Force, Lab Support Services Management Team, and Dr. Eric Cheng (CMIO). Together, they are working to streamline the development of built tests to enhance ordering practices for reference laboratories. The project endeavors to enhance patient safety and quality and ensure financial sustainability. The Department is providing project management and informatics support to achieve the following goals:

• (a) Will create specific new test builds for ~150 tests, to create additional discrete data fields and to limit provider choices to approved non-UCLA reference labs. 
• (b) Create a Tableau dashboard to be able to monitor outside lab usage. 
• (c) Monitor data to determine if any testing should be brought in house, consolidated, or investigated further for appropriateness. 
• (d) Monitor impact of interventions (utilization of test builds versus Misc. Ref Lab orderable, TAT, troubleshooting/result management by send out staff, etc). 

UPDATES & EVENTS

Enhancements have been made to the submission processes for QLC and Q-CEP, as outlined above. From now on, submissions can be submitted via the links below:

• QLC Submission Portal
• Q-CEP Submission Portal

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

January 2023 - Advanced Molecular Diagnostics Service Updates

ADVANCED MOLECULAR DIAGNOSTICS SERVICE (AMDS) UPDATES

The Advanced Molecular Diagnostics Service has been actively working on expansion of our current clinical cancer genomic offerings to support integrated clinical cancer care for the UCLA Health System, and to identify, support and advance UCLA translational research into clinical use and technology transfer.

TEAM EXPANSION

In the last 2-3 years, the Advanced Molecular Diagnostics Service has significantly expanded the team and recruited 11 new employees:

• Liying Zhang, MD, PhD, Director, Advanced Molecular Diagnostics Service
• Cyriac Kandoth, PhD, Director, Clinical Bioinformatics, Molecular Diagnostics
• Fumin Lin, PhD, Associate Director, Clinical Cytogenetics Laboratory and Molecular Diagnostics Laboratories (MDL)
• Hua (Helen) Jin, PhD, Manager, Molecular Diagnostics Laboratories (MDL)
• Layal Abi Farraj, PhD, Clinical Variant Scientist
• Xiavan Roopnarinesingh, PhD, Software Engineer
• Mahnoosh Rahimi, MS, Clinical Variant Scientist
• Ian Atol, MS, Software Engineer
• Beau Gray, CLS
• Yuqing Zoe Zhang, PhD, CLS
• Hailey Choi, PhD, CLS

PROMOTIONS/APPOINTMENTS

• Thien Huynh, Sr. Specialist, R&D
• Sze Man (Annabella) Leung, Sr. Specialist, Specimen Accession and Processing

The team launched two new solid tumor assays which utilize next-generation sequencing (NGS) technology to provide comprehensive tumor profiling for detection of substitutions (SNVs), insertion and deletion alterations (indels) and copy number variants (CNVs) and structural variants (SVs, gene fusions), as well as genomic signatures including microsatellite instability (MSI) and tumor mutational burden (TMB). These assays identity genetic alterations for cancer diagnostic, prognostic and therapeutic purposes. These assays were launched in early December 2022:

• Pan-cancer Solid Tumor NGS panel (1080 genes)
• Solid Tumor Fusion Panel (145 genes)

Starting from back (left-to-right):

Back - Jian (Jamie) Zhou, MS (CLS); Josh Deignan, PhD (Associate Director); Xiavan Roopnarinesingh, PhD (Bioinformatics Engineer); Layal Abi Farraj, PhD (Variant Scientist);

Cyriac Kandoth, PhD (Bioinformatics Director); Ian Atol, MS (Bioinformatics Engineer); Alden Huang, PhD (Fellow); Thien Huynh (Sr. CLS Specialist);

Svetlana (Lana) Rapoport (ISS Application Analyst, Beaker); Mahnoosh Rahimi, MS (Variant Scientist); Sze Man (Annabella) Leung (Sr. CLS Specialist); Fumin Lin, PhD (Associate Director);

Front - Sung-Hae (Sue) Kang, PhD (Associate Director); Leila Youssefian, PhD (Fellow); Liying (Lily) Zhang, MD, PhD (Director); Hua (Helen) Jin, PhD (Manager); Yan Li (Sr. CLS Specialist)