Scientific Advisory Board
The Leptomeningeal Cancer Foundation’s Scientific Advisory Board plays a key role in advancing our mission and achieving our goals. Members of our board are outstanding leaders in both leptomeningeal cancer research and clinical care. We are proud to be working with these accomplished and compassionate experts.
Allison Betof
MD, PhD
Associate Professor of Medicine, Oncology
Mark and Mary Stevens Endowed Scholar in Melanoma
Director, Melanoma Program
Director, Solid Tumor Cellular Therapy
Stanford University School of Medicine
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Dr. Allison Betof is an Associate Professor of Medicine (Oncology), Director of the Melanoma Program, Director of Solid Tumor Cellular Therapy, and Mark & Mary Stevens Endowed Scholar in Melanoma at Stanford University School of Medicine. Dr. Betof completed her MD and PhD at Duke University, Internal Medicine residency at Massachusetts General Hospital (Harvard University) and Medical Oncology Fellowship at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center.
Dr. Betof’s laboratory focuses on understanding resistance to immune checkpoint blockade and cellular therapies for melanoma and other solid tumors. She is the Principal Investigator of clinical trials exploring novel treatments for immunotherapy-refractory melanoma and is internationally recognized for her expertise in brain/CNS metastasis and the use of novel cellular therapies. Dr. Betof has been a pioneer in the use of commercial tumor infiltrating lymphocyte (TIL) therapy for the treatment of melanoma and other solid tumors. She has received funding and awards for her clinical and translational investigative work from multiple high-profile organizations, including the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO), National Institutes of Health (NIH), Melanoma Research Alliance, and Melanoma Research Foundation.
Adrienne Boire
MD, PhD
Neurologist and Neuro-Oncologist
Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center
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Dr. Adrienne Boire is a scientist and neuro-oncologist. She has a special interest in leptomeningeal metastasis and leads a laboratory-based team conducting basic research to understand the molecular mechanisms responsible for this condition. She has led groundbreaking research generating the first mouse models of leptomeningeal metastasis, and has pioneered the molecular understanding of leptomeningeal metastasis. Work from her laboratory has uncovered novel molecular targets for the treatment of leptomeningeal metastasis. She has brought these findings to the clinic in the form of early-phase clinical trials.
In addition to numerous awards, Dr. Boire holds the Geoffrey Been Junior Faculty Chair, is a Pew Biomedical Scholar, was elected a fellow of the American Academy of Neurology, and serves as the Scientific Director of the Alan and Sandra Gerry Metastasis and Tumor Ecosystems Center at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center.
Peter Forsyth
MD
Department Chair of Neuro-Oncology
H. Lee Moffitt Cancer Center & Research Institute
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Dr. Peter Forsyth is Department Chair of Neuro-Oncology at the H. Lee Moffitt Cancer Center & Research Institute and Professor of Oncology at the University of South Florida Morsani College of Medicine. He received his MD from McMaster University, Canada, completed his residency in Neurology at Mayo Clinic in Minnesota, and completed a fellowship in Neuro-Oncology at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in New York.
As an internationally recognized neuro-oncology physician-scientist, Dr. Forsyth has been primary investigator of numerous grants and clinical trials of new drugs and approaches for brain tumor and leptomeningeal disease (LMD) treatments. He is focused on immunocellular treatments for LMD and brain metastases using various laboratory, translational and clinical approaches. He is externally funded by grants from various programs, including the National Institutes of Health, Department of Defense, and the Bankhead-Coley Cancer Biomedical Research Program for a basic and translational research program. He has several clinical trials open, including Investigator-Initiated clinical trials that are externally funded in LMD and brain metastases.
Dr. Forsyth has published more than 250 manuscripts and serves on external review committees, study sections, NCCN and several others.
Isabella Glitza Oliva
MD, PhD, MS
Professor, Department of Melanoma Medical Oncology
Division of Cancer Medicine
The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center
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Dr. Isabella Glitza Oliva is a clinical investigator whose research focuses on developing immunotherapeutic strategies to improve clinical outcomes in melanoma patients with central nervous system (CNS) involvement. As director of the leptomeningeal disease (LMD) program in the MD Anderson Cancer Center’s Department of Melanoma Medical Oncology (MMO), she has led numerous efforts to improve the care of patients with LMD. She created the world’s largest database of melanoma patients with LMD and serves as the primary investigator (PI) on first- in human clinicals trials, using both intrathecal immunotherapy as well as systemic therapy. She is one of the PIs of the MD Anderson Melanoma SPORE. In addition to her regular clinic, she also staffs the MD Anderson Brain Metastases clinic.
Dr. Glitza Oliva has authored or co-authored numerous scientific publications and abstracts and serves as a scientific reviewer for multiple journals. She is an active member of the Society for Immunotherapy of Cancer (SITC) educational committee and serves as the director of planning committee for the SITC Clinical Immuno-Oncology Network workshop. At MD Anderson, she has served for many years as the MMO Patient Safety and Quality as well as Patient Experience Officer and represents MMO as the Associate Medical Director for the MD Anderson Skin and Melanoma Center. She represented the Faculty (~2000 faculty members) at MD Anderson as the elected Chair of the Institution’s Faculty Senate from 2021 to 2024.
Dr. Glitza Oliva received her M.D. and Ph.D. from Ruprecht-Karls University in Germany, and completed her clinical internship and residency in internal medicine at Albert Einstein Medical Center, her clinical fellowships at MD Anderson Cancer Center in Hematology and Oncology, and her Master’s at the UT Health Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences. Dr. Glitza Oliva is board-certified in internal medicine and medical oncology.
Gerald A. Grant
MD
Chair, Department of Neurosurgery
Allan H. Friedman Distinguished Professor of Neurosurgery
Professor in Neurology
Professor in Pediatrics
Professor in Neurobiology
Duke University Hospital, Duke Cancer Center
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Dr. Gerald Grant is the Allan H. Friedman Distinguished Professor and Chair of the Department of Neurosurgery at Duke University. Dr. Grant graduated with a Bachelor of Sciences degree in Neurosciences from Duke University and then completed his medical education at Stanford University School of Medicine. In 2002, Dr Grant fulfilled his commitment with the United States Air Force and served in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom. Dr Grant attained the rank of Lieutenant Colonel and was awarded a Meritorious Service Medal prior to his separation. He was then appointed as Assistant Professor of Neurosurgery and Pediatrics with tenure at Duke University. He was promoted to Associate Professor with Tenure and in 2013 transitioned back to Stanford as Division Chief of Pediatric Neurosurgery at Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital Stanford. He was promoted to the Botha Chan Endowed Professor of Neurosurgery and Associate Dean of Clinical Affairs at Stanford.
In 2022, Dr. Grant was recruited back to Duke as Chair of the Department of Neurosurgery. He has published over 390 peer reviewed manuscripts and serves on several Editorial Boards as Associate Editor including Neurosurgery and Journal of Neurosurgery Pediatrics in addition to his national leadership roles in neurosurgery. He has a specialized clinical interest in brain tumors and is a surgeon scientist focusing on ways to enhance delivery of promising agents across the blood-brain barrier. He is also on the board of Teen Cancer America to support adolescent and young adults with cancer.
Dr. Grant was honored to take care of brave Theo who was one of the greatest heroes of all time.
Dylan Hartley
PhD
Chief Scientific Officer
OnKure, Inc.
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Dylan Hartley is Chief Scientific Officer at OnKure Therapeutics in Boulder, Colorado. In this role, he directs research efforts focused on identifying new therapies for cancer patients. Previously, he was Vice President and Head of Research at Pfizer Boulder where he was responsible for a research team of 135 scientists focused on the discovery of cancer therapies.
During his 25 years in drug discovery and development, Dr. Hartley has held various positions at OnKure, Pfizer, Array Biopharma, Genentech, and Merck Research Laboratories. Over the course of his career, he has contributed to the discovery and development of multiple marketed drugs approved to treat cancer patients, including KADCYLA, MEKTOVI, BRAFTOVI, VITRAKVI, RETEVMO, TUKYSA, and KRAZATI. In addition, two novel drug discovery programs initiated under Dr. Hartley’s direction are currently advancing through clinical trials and include patients with specific brain cancers.
Dr. Hartley holds a Ph.D. in Pharmaceutical Sciences from the University of Colorado, was a post-doctoral fellow and research assistant professor in Toxicology at the University of Kansas Medical Center and was a Diplomate of the American Board of Toxicology. He is a contributing author on more than 45 primary research articles in journals such as Cancer Discovery, Clinical Cancer Research and the Journal of Medicinal Chemistry, amongst other relevant journals.
Jona Hattangadi-Gluth
MD
Radiation Oncologist
Chief of the Central Nervous System Tumor Service
UC San Diego School of Medicine
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Dr. Jona Hattangadi-Gluth, is a board-certified radiation oncologist who specializes in treating primary and metastatic brain tumors, as well as breast cancer. As a radiation oncologist, she uses high doses of radiation energy to destroy or damage cancer cells. Her expertise includes stereotactic radiosurgery (SRS) and stereotactic body radiation therapy (SBRT).
Dr. Hattangadi-Gluth is chief of the Central Nervous System Tumor Service and a co-leader of the Central Nervous System Disease Team at Moores Cancer Center. She is also an associate professor at UC San Diego School of Medicine and the associate director of the Center for Precision Radiation Medicine. She is actively involved in research to improve the efficacy and safety of radiation therapy for brain tumors. Specifically, her research lab focuses on developing novel imaging tools to improve radiation oncology treatments and using functional and quantitative MRI to measure response to radiation in cancer patients.
Dr. Hattangadi-Gluth completed residency training in radiation oncology and earned her medical degree from Harvard Medical School. She also completed research training in breast oncology and imaging at UC San Francisco as a Doris Duke research fellow and was also a Fulbright scholar.
Melanie Hayden Gephart
MD
Professor of Neurosurgery
Professor of Neurology and Neurological Sciences (by courtesy)
Stanford University School of Medicine
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Dr. Melanie Hayden Gephart is a brain tumor neurosurgeon, treating patients with malignant and benign tumors, including gliomas, brain metastases, meningiomas, and schwannomas. She directs the Stanford Brain Tumor Center and the Stanford Brain Metastasis Consortium, collaborative unions of physicians and scientists looking to improve understanding and treatment of brain tumors.
Dr. Hayden Gephart’s laboratory seeks greater understanding of the mechanisms driving tumorigenesis and disease progression in malignant brain tumors. They study how rare cancer cell populations survive and migrate in the brain, inadvertently supported by native brain cells. Her lab develops novel cerebrospinal fluid-based biomarkers to track brain cancer treatment response, relapse, and neurotoxicity. Their bedside-to-bench-to-bedside research model builds on a foundation of generously donated patient samples, where they test mechanisms of brain cancer growth, develop novel pre-clinical models that reliably recapitulate the human disease, and facilitate clinical trials of new treatments for patients with brain cancer.
Priya Kumthekar
MD
Professor, Neurology (Neuro-Oncology)
Professor, Medicine (Hematology and Oncology)
Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine
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Dr. Priya Kumthekar is a board-certified clinical neuro-oncologist. She has been involved in the creation of brain tumor treatment guidelines and standards through various leadership roles, including serving on the National Comprehensive Cancer Network Central Nervous System (CNS) committee. She is a national leader in neuro oncology professional organizations, including being a co-chair for the 2024 SNO (Society of Neuro Oncology)/ASCO (American Society of Clinical Oncology) CNS Cancer Conference and previously serving as the ASCO CNS Educational Chair. At the 2023 SNO meeting, she was awarded as the Women in Neuro Oncology Exemplary Mid-Career Physician.
Dr. Kumthekar is currently involved in and leads clinical trials in neuro-oncology, including being the principal investigator (PI)/study chair of six treatment trials and the site PI of over a dozen collaborative brain tumor treatment trials. These trials include CNS breast cancer metastases, meningiomas and leptomeningeal cancer. She also has been actively involved in National Cancer Institute funded clinical trials for many years. She has served in multiple leadership roles within the National Clinical Trials Network, and in 2015, was appointed institutional Alliance Principal Investigator. Dr. Kumthekar also serves as the national Executive Officer of Neuro-Oncology Clinical Trials at the Alliance where she oversees the conception and development of clinical trials from early phase through registration studies.
Seema Nagpal
MD
Neuro-Oncologist
Stanford Cancer Center
Clinical Professor, Neurology and Neurological Sciences
Clinical Professor (by courtesy), Neurosurgery
Stanford University School of Medicine
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Dr. Seema Nagpal is a board certified neuro-oncologist, clinical professor of neurology & neurological sciences, and clinical professor (by courtesy) of neurosurgery at Stanford University School of Medicine. She treats both primary brain tumors as well as metastatic disease to the brain and nervous system. Her research concentrates on clinical trials for patients with late-stage central nervous system cancer. She has a special interest in leptomeningeal disease, a devastating complication of lung and breast cancers.
Dr. Nagpal collaborates with Stanford scientists to detect this disease earlier, and collaborates with Stanford’s breast and lung oncologists to formulate treatments that improve quality of life and survival for her patients.
Yolanda Pina
MD
Assistant Professor
Clinical Investigator
Director, Leptomeningeal Program
Department of Neuro-Oncology
H. Lee Moffitt Cancer Center and Research Institute
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Dr. Yolanda Piña is a neurology trained neuro-oncologist, assistant professor, clinical investigator, and Director of the Leptomeningeal Program in the Department of Neuro-Oncology at the H. Lee Moffitt Cancer Center and Research Institute. She has conducted experimental research since 2003, initially at Bascom Palmer Eye Institute of the University of Miami, where her team had groundbreaking discoveries in the therapeutics of retinoblastoma. Currently, she is a PI and co-PI of several clinical trials including Investigator Initiated Clinical Trials using immunocellular therapies to treat patients with CNS disease.
Dr. Piña was awarded grants from the Melanoma and Skin Cancers Center of Excellence and Melanoma Research Alliance to evaluate autologous tumor reactive T cells as potential immunocellular therapy in patients with leptomeningeal cancer from melanoma. Her research work is revealed in over 50 peer-reviewed publications in cancer research, with more than 20 of these as first or senior author. Her goal is to discover and improve innovative, biologically-driven therapies in leptomeningeal cancer that will be effective in enhancing overall survival of patients.
Inna Smalley
PhD
Assistant Member
Department of Metabolism and Physiology
Donald A. Adam Melanoma and Skin Cancer Center of Excellence
Moffitt Cancer Center
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Inna Smalley is an Assistant Member at the Moffitt Cancer Center in Tampa Florida. She has more than 18 years of experience studying cancer biology and 10 years of experience studying central nervous system (CNS) metastases. Dr. Smalley has extensive expertise in studying the role of the tumor microenvironment in tumor growth and drug resistance. She is a leading world expert on the basic science of leptomeningeal cancer.
Dr. Smalley has broad experience analyzing high-throughput proteomic, metabolomic, and transcriptomic datasets. She has optimized the application of several spatial transcriptomics and single-cell analysis techniques for analyzing patient tumor specimens and cerebrospinal fluid-circulating tumor cells. She has helped develop advanced bioinformatics techniques to model changes in signaling and metabolism with the goal of identifying unique vulnerabilities of subpopulations of cells.
Dr. Smalley’s research group has a great interest in exploring tumor microenvironments among different metastatic sites to elucidate what drives certain cells to certain metastatic sites, as well as the mechanisms supporting their survival on therapy and immune evasion in different microenvironments, with a special focus on tumor metabolism. Dr. Smalley is deeply committed to mentoring early career scientists, especially those from underrepresented race, gender, and ethnic groups. She has previously published under her maiden name: Inna V. Fedorenko.
Eleanor Villanueva
PA-C
Physician Assistant
Neuro-Oncology Clinic, Stanford Cancer Center
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Eleanor Villanueva, PA-C is a board certified physician assistant at Stanford Neuro-Oncology clinic treating both primary and secondary brain tumors including leptomeningeal metastases. She is passionate in the multidisciplinary approach to treatment to ensure patients maintain quality of life and neurologic function. She is also involved in treating patients enrolled in clinical trials. As a provider, she strongly believes in patient education and advocacy to empower patients to make well-informed decisions and self-advocate. Her training allowed her to serve a diverse group of patients in community health centers and Federally Qualified Health Centers (FQHCs), which has molded and strengthened her passion in patient advocacy.
Jonathan T. Yang
MD, PhD
Associate Professor
Department of Radiation Oncology
NYU Grossman School of Medicine
Director, Clinical Research
Brain Spine Tumor Center
NYU Langone Health’s Perlmutter Cancer Center
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Dr. Jonathan T. Yang, is an Associate Professor at New York University School of Medicine Department of Radiation Oncology. He serves as the Director of Clinical Research for the Laura and Isaac Perlmutter Cancer Center-Brain and Spine Tumor Center. He is also the Associate Vice Chair of Clinical Research and Developmental Therapeutics and the Director of Metastatic Disease Service in the Department of Radiation Oncology.
Dr. Yang’s clinical and academic expertise is in central nervous system malignancies, metastatic disease, and precision radiation oncology through rational combination of novel therapeutics with radiotherapy for which he serves as the principal investigator of several ongoing first-in-human trials investigating DNA damage response inhibitors with radiation. He is also focused on translational biomarker development to guide appropriate treatment selection in patients.
In addition, Dr. Yang has been passionate in advancing the treatment of patients with leptomeningeal disease. He has run practice changing studies in these areas and developed programs using novel therapeutic agents as radiation sensitizers in genetically stratified patient subsets with cancer that has metastasized to the CNS. Furthermore, he has worked to develop biomarkers to drive therapeutic decision-making using CSF cell-free circulating tumor DNA and circulating tumor cells.
Dr. Yang earned his medical degree from Yale School of Medicine and a doctorate from Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam. He did his radiation oncology training at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, where he stayed on as faculty until he moved to the University of Washington School of Medicine where he was an associate professor.