Each year the San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium (SABCS) awards scholarships to researchers who are early in their career in an effort to help get their work seen and disseminated. While #SABCS20 will be virtual, their work will be exposed to thousands. You can still register to see their amazing work at sabcs.org.

Below are the winners of the scholarships awarded through SABCS and co-sponsor, the American Association of Cancer Research (AACR).

Li

Fitzpatrick

Mori

Khanna

Li

SABCS Basic Science Scholar Award Recipients — For laboratory-based investigators-in-training whose work focuses on the biology of breast cancer and preclinical models of its development and progression.

• Zheqi Li, PhD, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh: Hotspot ESR1 mutations rewire cell-cell adhesome to facilitate breast cancer metastasis, GS1-05 Wednesday, Dec. 9, 10 a.m.
• Amanda Fitzpatrick, Institute of Cancer Research, London: Genomic profiling of breast cancer leptomeningeal metastasis (BCLM) reveals a divergent evolution and therapeutic targets, PD13-03 Friday, Dec. 11, 1 p.m.
• Hitomi Mori, MD, City of Hope, Duarte, California: Estrogen-induced cell cycle arrest as an unexpected outcome of aromatase inhibitor-resistance: Insights from single-cell trajectory analysis of a patient-derived xenograft model, PD7-02 Thursday, Dec. 10 1 p.m.
• Pooja Khanna, MS, Cancer Institute of New Jersey, Rutgers University, New Brunswick, New Jersey: Sox4 and smarca4 upregulate glycolysis-driven tumor proliferation through hexokinase 2 in TNBC, PD15-09 Friday, Dec. 11, 3:30 p.m.
• Ran Li, FRACS, Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre, Melbourne, Australia: Tucatinib favorably modulates the immune microenvironment and synergizes with anti-PD1 therapy in a trastuzumab resistant HER2+ murine model, PS10-04 Wednesday, Dec. 9

Blondeaux

Cereser

Khaki

Van der Noordaa

Wang

SABCS Clinical Scholar Award Recipients — For clinical scientists-in-training who are actively pursuing clinical or clinical/translational research in breast cancer.

• Eva Blondeaux, MD, IRCCS, University of Genoa, Genoa, Italy: Chances of pregnancy after breast cancer, reproductive and disease outcomes: a systematic review and meta-analysis, GS3-09 Thursday, Dec. 10, 11 a.m.
• Biancastella Cereser, PhD, Imperial College London, London: Mutational burden of the normal breast during age and pregnancy, PD5-10 Thursday, Dec. 10, 2:15 p.m.
• Ali Raza Khaki, MD, University of Washington, Seattle Cancer Care Alliance and Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, Seattle: Characteristics and outcomes of SARS-CoV-2 infection in patients with invasive breast cancer (BC) from the COVID-19 and Cancer Consortium (CCC19) Cohort Study, PS7-01 Wednesday, Dec. 9
• Marieke van der Noordaa, MD, Netherlands Cancer Institute/University of California, BE, Amsterdam: Assessing prognosis after neoadjuvant therapy: A comparison between anatomic ypAJCC staging, Residual Cancer Burden Class and Neo-Bioscore, GS4-07 Friday, Dec. 11 10:15 a.m.
• Haiyun Wang, MD, MPH, Division of Hematology, Oncology and Transplantation, University of Minnesota Medical School, Minneapolis: Impact of body mass index on pathological complete response after neoadjuvant chemotherapy: Results from the I-SPY 2 Trial, PS6-05 Wednesday, Dec. 9

Robinson

Batra

Chic

Pascual

Gade

Coltman Scholar Award Recipients — In memory of Dr. Charles A. Coltman, co-founder of SABCS, to commemorate the significant contributions he made to oncology medicine. For clinical scientists-in-training.

• Tim Robinson, MBBS, PhD, MRCP, University of Bristol, Bristol, United Kingdom: Exploring the causal role of the human gut microbiome in breast cancer risk using mendelian randomization, GS2-06 Wednesday, Dec. 9, 2:15 p.m.
• Atul Batra, DM (Medical Oncology), Tom Baker Cancer Centre, University of Calgary, Calgary, Alberta, Canada: Long-term risks of cerebrovascular accidents (CVAs) in patients with breast cancer, PD12-04 Friday, Dec. 11, 3:30 p.m.
• Nuria Chic Ruché, MD, Institut d'Investigacions Biomédiques August Pi | Sunyer (IDIBAPS), Barcelona, Spain: Celtil score and long-term survival outcome in early stage HER2-positive (HER2+) breast cancer treated with anti-HER2-based chemotherapy: a correlative analysis of neoALTTO trial, PS5-03 Wednesday, Dec. 9
• Javier Pascual, MD, The Royal Marsden NHS Foundation Trust and The Institute of Cancer Research, London: Assessment of early ctDNA dynamics to predict efficacy of targeted therapies in metastatic breast cancer: results from plasmaMATCH trial, PS5-02 Wednesday, Dec. 9
• Kristine Gade, MD, University of Pittsburgh Medical Center, Pittsburgh: Patient-reported outcomes and health care utilization of UPMC breast cancer survivorship clinic patients, PD12-10 Thursday, Dec. 10 3:30 p.m.

Lee

Han

Makhlin

Kassem

Abraham

AACR Associate Member Award Recipients — For presenters of meritorious abstracts who are Associate Members of the American Association for Cancer Research (AACR).

• Joyce V. Lee, PhD, University of California, San Francisco: The MYC oncogene suppresses tumor immune infiltration and function which is reversible with combinatorial immunotherapies, GS1-08 Wednesday, Dec. 9, 10:45 a.m.
• Yunan Han, MD, Washington University School of Medicine, St. Louis: Changes in body mass index (BMI) over the life course are associated with gene expression in postmenopausal women, PS7-03 Wednesday, Dec. 9
• Igor Makhlin, MD, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia: Investigating the clinical utility of tumor mutational burden in predicting rapid progression and death in patients with metastatic breast cancer, PD9-10 Thursday, Dec. 10, 3:30 p.m.
• Nawal Kassem, MD, Indiana University School of Medicine, Indianapolis: Circulating TP53 mutations in TNBC after neoadjuvant chemotherapy is associated with rapid disease recurrence: correlative analysis from clinical trial BRE12-158, PD15-06 Friday, Dec. 11, 3:30 p.m.
• Hannah Grace Abraham, BSE, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Michigan: Incidence and survival of inflammatory breast cancer between 1973 - 2015 in the Surveillance, Epidemiology and End Results (SEER) database, PS7-06 Wednesday, Dec. 9

Seth

Abuhadra

Yun

Walens

Gou

• Sahil Seth, MS, Biostatistics, UT MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston: A tiered algorithm using mid-therapy ultrasound (US) response assessment and a novel gene expression signature (GES) improves the prediction of pathologic complete response (pCR) to neoadjuvant therapy (NAT) in triple-negative breast cancer (TNBC): Results from the ARTEMIS trial (NCT02276443), PD9-05 Thursday, Dec. 10, 3:30 p.m.
• Nour Abuhadra, MD, UT MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston: Prospective evaluation of patients with metaplastic (Mp) triple negative breast cancer (TNBC): molecular characteristics and outcomes with neoadjuvant therapy (NAT), PS18-04 Wednesday, Dec. 9
• Yun Lu, BSE, University of Alabama at Birmingham, Birmingham, Alabama: [⁸⁹-Zr]pertuzumab pet imaging reveals paclitaxel treatment efficacy is positively correlated with her2 expression in human breast cancer xenograft mouse models, PS3-03 Wednesday, Dec. 9
• Andrea Walens, PhD, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, North Carolina: DNA repair imbalance and immune response in breast cancer mortality disparities, PS19-03 Wednesday, Dec. 9
• Xuxu Gou, MS, Baylor College of Medicine, Houston: Recurrent active ESR1 fusions render a diagnostic transcriptional signature in metastatic breast cancer, PS17-03 Wednesday, Dec. 9