Pankind Scientific Meeting 2025 Booklet

Dr Belinda Lee is a Medical Oncologist at the Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre & Northern Health hospital. She completed her undergraduate medical degree at Imperial College, University of London and her oncology training at the Royal Marsden Hospital, Imperial College Hospitals, and the Institute of Cancer Research, University of London, UK, before completing her Fellowship in Australia. 

Dr Lee is the Cancer Services Research Lead and Head of Cancer Clinical Trials at Northern Health and a member of the Biogrid Scientific Advisory Committee, the Victorian Comprehensive Cancer Centre (VCCC) Registry-based Trials Steering Committee and the Victorian Pancreas Summit working group. 

Dr Lee is the Chief Investigator of the PURPLE Pancreatic cancer Translational Registry, a collaborative Pancreatic cancer research platform that she established in 2016. She co-chairs a number of Investigator-led trials including the DYNAMIC-pancreas, DIRECT-InspIRE, the Pancreatic cancer biomarker study. 

Dr Lee was awarded the Kellaway Excellence Award for Translational Research (2020) and was selected as a finalised in the Victorian Premiers Awards for Health and Medical Research (2021). 

A/Prof. Barreto is a Gastrointestinal and Hepato Pancreato-Biliary surgeon. He is currently a Consultant Surgeon (HPB & Liver Transplant) at the Flinders Medical Centre, South Australia. He is also the Deputy Director of the Flinders Medical Program. He earned his PhD studying the pathogenesis of acute pancreatitis. His active research interests include acute pancreatitis, pancreatic cancer and young-onset cancers. A/Prof. Barreto has authored more than 290 clinical and basic science papers and book chapters.

Professor Anthony J Gill AM Professor of Surgical Pathology at the University of Sydney, a senior staff specialist in anatomical pathology at the Royal North Shore Hospital in Sydney and chairman of the Australian Pancreatic Genome Initiative (APGI). His scope of clinical practice includes both anatomical (surgical and cytological) pathology and targeted molecular testing of tumours, with an emphasis on biomarker development and companion diagnostic testing for targeted therapies.

Eileen M. O’Reilly holds the Winthrop Rockefeller Endowed Chair in Medical Oncology at Memorial Sloan Kettering (MSK). She serves as the Section Head for Hepatopancreaticobiliary/ Neuroendocrine Cancers, Gastrointestinal Oncology Service, Co-Director for Medical Initiatives at the David M. Rubenstein Center for Pancreatic Cancer and is an Attending Physician and Member at MSK and Professor of Medicine at Weill Cornell Medical College.

Dr. O’Reilly received her medical degree at Trinity College in Ireland. She completed her postgraduate training in Ireland and subsequent Hematology/Oncology Fellowship training at MSK. Dr. O’Reilly is a clinical scientist whose research focus involves integration of molecular and genetic-based therapies for pancreas cancer along with development of adjuvant and neoadjuvant treatments and identification of biomarkers for therapy selection. Dr. O’Reilly teaches and mentors junior faculty, oncology fellows, residents and medical/other students and has numerous teaching and other awards. Dr. O’Reilly is the Principal Investigator of multiple phase I, II, III trials in pancreas cancer and has authored/co-authored ~425 articles, editorials, and book chapters and has a H-index of 100. She serves as an Associate Editor for the Journal of Clinical Oncology and Senior Editor for several other journals and has served on multiple grant review panels including, for the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO), American Association of Cancer Research (AACR), NIH, DOD, and various international entities. She is PI of the MSK Pancreas Specialized Program in Oncology Research Excellence (SPORE), an NCI funded team science grant. Dr. O’Reilly is the recipient of numerous awards including the Burkitt Medal (TCD) in 2022, and Giants of Cancer Care GI Oncology, 2023.

Dr. O’Reilly’s other responsibilities include Chair of the Human Research Protection Program and Institutional Review & Privacy Board (IRB). Nationally, Dr. O’Reilly is Co-Chair of the NCI Alliance Co-Operative Group Gastrointestinal Cancers Committee and serves on the NCI Gastrointestinal Cancers Steering Committee (GISC) and serves in leadership roles in several advocacy organizations including the National Pancreas Foundation, Hirshberg Foundation and Pancreas Cancer Action Network.

Dr. Lowy holds the Levine Family Chancellor’s Distinguished Chair in Surgical Oncology and is Professor of Surgery, Director of Surgical Oncology, and Associate Director of Moores Cancer Center at UC San Diego Health.  He is a physician-scientist whose clinical and research primarily focuses on identifying and testing novel therapies for pancreatic cancer.  His laboratory co-developed the first mouse model of human pancreatic cancer which has become the standard in the field, has been licensed to pharma and used by hundreds of labs worldwide. The laboratory focuses on novel target identification, preclinical modeling and experimental therapeutics. Dr. Lowy’s research has led to the development and testing of novel therapies which have reached the clinic most recently a tumor penetrating peptide which is being tested in randomized Phase 2 trials. 

Dr. Lowy has served in a number of national leadership roles including the NCI Clinical Trials and Translational Research Committee which advised on development of pancreatic cancer research priorities for the Recalcitrant Cancers Act, serving as vice-chair of the NCI Pancreatic Cancer Task Force, and chair from 2016-2021. He now serves on the NCI GI Steering Committee and has served as co-leader of the SWOG pancreas cancer subcommittee since 2007. Dr. Lowy serves on the NCCN pancreatic cancer guidelines panel and on advisory boards for PANCAN, The Lustgarten Foundation, PANKIND, and The National Pancreas Foundation. Most recently, Dr. Lowy co-led the creation of the University of California Pancreatic Cancer Consortium.

Prof David Thomas is the inaugural Director of the Centre for Molecular Oncology at the University of New South Wales and Chief Strategy and Science Officer at Omico.

As a clinician-scientist, his focus is on the application of genomic technologies to the understanding and management of cancer, particularly sarcoma. He established the not-for-profit company, Australian Genomic Cancer Medicine Centre, trading as Omico, to lead a national precision medicine program for patients with rare and early onset cancers.  He has over 200 research publications, including lead or senior author papers in Science, Cancer Cell, Journal of Clinical Investigation and Lancet Oncology.

Professor Jayesh Desai is a Clinician Researcher and Medical Oncologist at the Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre (PeterMac) with extensive experience in translational research applied to drug development/ trials/precision-oncology. He is Associate Director for Clinical Research at PeterMac, and Head of the Phase I/Early Drug Development Program, internationally recognised as being in the top tier of Global Phase I cancer trials programs.

He has been the Principal Investigator on over 80 clinical trials over the last ten years, including 50+ Phase I and first in human trials. A key area of focus has been in agents targeting the MAPK pathway in colorectal cancer, having led the development of BRAF inhibitors since the first agents were developed, other agents targeting key elements of the RAF/RAS/MAPK pathway, followed more recently with direct KRAS-directed approaches. These have included 1st in human trials with sotorasib, divarasib, and more recently with a number of KRAS G12D and pan-RAS inhibitors. These agents, particularly G12D and pan-RAS ihibitors, are now showing promise in Pancreatic Cancer, and he is passionate about ensuring Australian patients can access these through clinical trials.

He has authored approximately 200 publications in high impact journals including the NEJM, Nature, The Lancet and JCO. He has been on scientific committees focused on drug development for major conferences including ASCO, ESMO and AACR (Clinical Trials Co-Chair for 2025-26). Jayesh has received approximately $70 million in competitive grant funding to help build his research programs.

Prof. Andrew Scott leads the Tumour Targeting Laboratory at the Olivia Newton-John Cancer Research Institute; is Director, Department of Molecular Imaging and Therapy, Austin Health; and is Professor, University of Melbourne and La Trobe University in Melbourne, Australia.

Prof Scott's clinical and research interests are focused on developing innovative strategies for targeted therapy of cancer, and molecular imaging and theranostics in oncology. There have been 7 therapeutic antibodies developed in his laboratory that have been licenced to Pharma and Biotech, and four have progressed to Phase I/II/III clinical trials.

Prof Scott has also been a lead Commissioner of the highly impactful Lancet Oncology Commission on Medical Imaging and Nuclear Medicine, and the Lancet Oncology Commission on Radiotherapy and Theranostics. He has received many awards, including Member of the Order of Australia (AM), election as Fellow of the Australian Academy of Health and Medical Sciences, the Lackmann Award for Translational Research, the Saul Hertz Award from SNMMI, and Fellow of SNMMI (FSNMMI). Prof Scott has published 485 peer reviewed papers and 27 book chapters, is an inventor on 25 patents, and has received over $35 million in peer reviewed grant funding in the last 5 years.

Professor Claudine Bonder (BSc(Hons), PhD) is the head of the Vascular Biology and Cell Trafficking Laboratory at the Centre for Cancer Biology (an Alliance between UniSA and SA Pathology). 

Having completed her undergraduate and post-graduate degrees in Adelaide, Claudine trained in Canada before returning to Australia with an NHMRC Peter Doherty Fellowship. She has over 20 years’ experience in advancing medical research, ~100 scientific publications, is an inventor on granted patents, mentors the next generation of scientists, chairs the local consumer advocacy group and is a scientific advisor to industry. 

The overarching focus of her research program is to better understand how blood vessels contribute to disease; particularly solid tumours. More specifically, her program investigates how cancer cells can mimic endothelial cells to form their own vascular structures for tumour growth and metastasis.

Dr. Shona Ritchie completed her PhD in 2024 under the supervision of Prof. Paul Timpson and Dr. Brooke Pereira at the Garvan Institute of Medical Research.

Her research employed mass spectrometry proteomics to characterise the extracellular matrix and epithelial secretome in metastatic pancreatic cancer, identifying novel co-targets to improve chemotherapy response.

She is currently a Postdoctoral Research Officer and Cancer Institute NSW Early Career Fellow at the Garvan Institute, where she is investigating the repurposing of clinically-approved drugs in
combination with standard-of-care therapies to enhance treatment efficacy in advanced pancreatic cancer

Dr Winter is a Cancer Council SA Mid-Career Research Fellow and works at the Bowel Health Service, Flinders University. There, Dr Winter leads the Biomarker Discovery and Application research program, which aims to find new ways to test and detect many different types of cancers.

Dr Winter works with a variety of specialists in different disciplines, including medical oncologists, gastroenterologists, surgeons, biostatisticians, epidemiologists, health economists, and lived experience consumers to support the goals of the research program.

Dr Winter’s main research interest is discovering and testing circulating tumour DNA methylation blood biomarkers using next generation technologies. In 2024, Dr Winter was awarded the Pankind Early Detection Award, which will use proximity ligation-based proteomics assays developed by Olink to measure >5,000 low-abundant plasma proteins. The aim is to identify novel, low-abundant plasma proteins associated with early-stage pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma and develop a new test for early-stage pancreatic cancer detection.

Dr Ying Zhu is a Senior Lecturer at the School of Biomedical Engineering, University of Technology Sydney (UTS), where she leads the Laboratory of In-Vitro NanoDiagnostics. Her research focuses on advancing diagnostic technologies by translating frontier nanotechnologies into practical clinical applications.

Dr Zhu completed her PhD in optical biosensors (2011-2015) from Australia's preeminent biosensor and biodevice research group at UNSW, working under the guidance of Professor Justin Gooding. She then expanded her expertise in translational cancer research as a postdoctoral fellow (2015–2017) at Dartmouth College's Thayer School of Engineering in the USA, focusing on the clinical applications of biosensors. Her contributions to cancer diagnostics were further recognised with a Cancer Institute NSW Early Career Fellowship (2017–2020), which supported her work in developing advanced nanoplasmonic biosensors. Dr. Zhu joined UTS as a Lecturer in 2020 and was promoted to Senior Lecturer in 2023. She was awarded an ARC Discovery Early Career Researcher Award (DECRA) in 2024.

Dr. Zhu’s current research takes a multidisciplinary approach, combining chemistry, physics, materials science, nanotechnology, and biomedicine. She is committed to translational biomedical research, developing new analytical technologies through collaborative efforts to bridge laboratory discoveries with patient care.