The appointments reflect the increasingly integrated nature of modern oncology research, in which laboratory discoveries, clinical trial design, pharmacy operations, patient safety, data management, and professional development must function as a single system. NRG Oncology is part of the National Cancer Institute’s National Clinical Trials Network and coordinates multicenter studies across more than 1,300 research sites worldwide, with a major focus on breast, gynecologic, prostate, and other localized or locally advanced cancers.

Rebecca Arend, MD, MPH, has been appointed Gynecology Oncologist Vice Chair of the NRG Translational Science Committee. A gynecologic oncologist, surgeon-scientist, and clinical trial leader, Arend studies how molecular features of cancer can be converted into more precise methods of screening, prognosis, and treatment selection. Her work includes DNA, RNA, protein, and circulating tumor DNA, or ctDNA, a form of genetic material released by tumors into the bloodstream that can provide a minimally invasive view of cancer biology.

Arend’s research is especially focused on ovarian, endometrial, cervical, and other gynecologic cancers, diseases in which tumors can vary substantially at the molecular level even when they arise in the same organ. Biomarker-driven treatment aims to identify those differences and match patients with therapies most likely to work. As Associate Director of Clinical Research at the O’Neal Comprehensive Cancer Center, Arend oversees trial infrastructure, protocol development, workforce training, and the integration of translational research into clinical programs. Within NRG, she is Translational Science Chair of the Ovarian Subcommittee under the Gynecologic Cancer Committee and is involved in developing early-career oncology investigators.

Robin Lockhorst, PharmD, BCOP, BCPS, has been appointed Chair of the NRG Pharmacy Subcommittee. With more than 15 years of experience at Avera Cancer Institute, Lockhorst has worked across oncology pharmacy, bone marrow transplantation, solid organ transplantation, hepatology, and clinical research. She currently serves as Director of Clinical Research, Oncology, where she is expanding satellite research programs and helping build early-phase trial capabilities across the Great Plains region.

Pharmacy leadership is central to the safe delivery of experimental cancer treatments. Clinical pharmacists review protocols, manage investigational drug services, verify dosing and drug interactions, and help ensure that treatment is administered according to highly specific study requirements. Lockhorst has led operational improvements in these areas while supporting protocol review and multidisciplinary education. Her work has also included mentoring pharmacy trainees and helping advance South Dakota’s drug donation and repository pilot program, an initiative designed to improve access to eligible medications.

David Miyamoto, MD, PhD, has been appointed Radiation Oncology Vice Chair of the NRG Translational Science Committee. A radiation oncologist and physician-scientist at Massachusetts General Hospital, an Associate Professor at Harvard Medical School, and an Associate Member of the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard, Miyamoto investigates how molecular testing and advanced imaging can make cancer treatment more predictive. His laboratory research has emphasized liquid biopsies, tumor genomic analysis, and imaging technologies for prostate and bladder cancers.

The goal of this work is to identify biological signals that reveal whether a tumor is responding to treatment, developing resistance, or progressing before those changes become obvious through conventional clinical assessments. Miyamoto has led NIH-funded research involving liquid biopsy and prostate-specific membrane antigen, or PSMA, positron emission tomography imaging in patients receiving Lu-PSMA-617 radioligand therapy. This treatment delivers radiation to cancer cells that express PSMA, and biomarkers may help determine which patients are most likely to benefit. Miyamoto has also served in translational leadership roles on major multicenter studies, including NRG-GU015, ECOG-ACRIN-NRG 8185, and the PARTIQoL trial.

Elena Nelson, MBA, CCRC, has been appointed Vice Chair of the Clinical Research Associate Subcommittee within the NRG Protocol Support Committee. Nelson brings more than 15 years of oncology research experience from the University of Florida Health Cancer Center, where she serves as Data Management and Academic Research Consortium Network Manager. In that role, she leads data operations for approximately 150 trials involving solid tumors, hematologic malignancies, pediatric cancers, and early-phase therapies.

High-quality data are essential to determining whether a treatment is safe and effective. Nelson has developed standardized workflows to improve the accuracy, completeness, and timeliness of trial information, including data submitted for NCI-sponsored and experimental therapeutics studies. She is also a RECIST subject matter expert. RECIST, or Response Evaluation Criteria in Solid Tumors, is a standardized system used to measure whether tumors have shrunk, remained stable, or grown during treatment. Nelson has worked with NRG on the RECIST CLASS project and has served as both a member and mentor within the Protocol Support Committee.

Cortney Montgomery, MD, MHSc, has been appointed Vice Chair of the NRG Protocol Support Committee Mentorship Subcommittee. With more than 25 years of experience in oncology research nursing and clinical trial coordination, Montgomery has worked in academic medical centers, comprehensive cancer centers, and direct patient-care settings. At UPMC Hillman Cancer Center, she serves as a Clinical Research Coordinator and Treatment Nurse, managing patient screening, informed consent, investigational drug administration, chemotherapy delivery, and protocol compliance while helping establish a new Clinical Translational Research Center.

Montgomery has coordinated Phase I through Phase IV studies, including industry-sponsored, cooperative group, and investigator-initiated trials. Her clinical research experience spans breast cancer, gynecologic oncology, and early-phase therapeutics, where careful monitoring is particularly important because experimental treatments may involve uncertain dosing, novel mechanisms, or previously unrecognized toxicities. She has also contributed to clinical trial awareness and outreach through the Carol Glock Foundation and has served NRG as a committee member, mentor, and liaison to the Breast Cancer Committee and Uterine Corpus Cancer Subcommittee.

Together, the appointments highlight how cancer research increasingly depends on collaboration across disciplines rather than on isolated discoveries. Biomarker scientists need reliable clinical samples and high-quality datasets; radiation and medical oncologists require pharmacy systems capable of delivering complex therapies; and clinical research teams need experienced mentors to sustain the workforce behind multicenter trials. NRG Oncology said the new leaders will help advance its research while continuing the contributions of outgoing vice chairs. Current committee leadership and member openings are listed on the organization’s website.

Subject of Research: Leadership changes in a major oncology clinical trials network, with emphasis on translational cancer research, biomarkers, pharmacy operations, clinical trial data management, and research mentorship.

Article Title: NRG Oncology Appoints New Leaders to Advance Precision Cancer Research and Clinical Trials

Web References: https://www.nrgoncology.org/Current-Openings ; https://www.nrgoncology.org

References: NRG Oncology leadership announcement and organizational information provided in the source material.

Keywords: NRG Oncology, cancer research, clinical trials, translational science, biomarkers, circulating tumor DNA, liquid biopsy, radiation oncology, gynecologic oncology, pharmacy research, RECIST, precision medicine, oncology leadership, clinical research mentorship

The DMC’s efforts have centered on generating high-quality, systematic data sets that interrogate cancer cell vulnerabilities across genetic, pharmacologic, and phenotypic dimensions. These datasets are generated using innovative models, including three-dimensional culture systems such as organoids and spheroids, which more faithfully replicate tumor biology than traditional cell lines. Functional genomics approaches, complemented by the consortium’s large-scale chemical screening platform PRISM, have enabled detailed mapping of cancer vulnerabilities at scale, offering nuanced insights into tumor biology and therapeutic response mechanisms.

Among its key technological advancements, the DMC has pioneered multi-omics approaches that integrate genomic, transcriptomic, proteomic, and epigenomic data. This comprehensive profiling facilitates the discovery of synthetic lethal interactions and biomarker signatures, which are critical for stratifying patients and tailoring precise therapeutic regimens. Further, single-cell analyses have been deployed to unravel intratumoral heterogeneity, providing a granular view of cancer subpopulations and their differential susceptibilities to treatments.

One of the standout achievements of the DMC 2.0 phase was the dramatic expansion of the cancer cell line collection to include over 2,000 models, spanning a diverse range of human cancer subtypes. This diversity is crucial for capturing the extensive heterogeneity seen in human tumors and for ensuring that drug discovery efforts are broadly applicable. Screening of approximately 400 compounds across 900 cell lines illuminated critical vulnerabilities and underscored the importance of combinatorial drug screening to overcome functional redundancies in cancer.

The consortium’s translational impact is exemplified by the identification of therapeutically actionable targets such as the WRN helicase in microsatellite instability-high (MSI+) cancers and the protein arginine methyltransferase 5 (PRMT5) in cancers with MTAP/CDKN2A co-deletion. Both targets have engendered clinical trials evaluating novel therapeutic candidates, exemplifying how functional genomics can directly inform drug development pipelines. More recently, the consortium identified the ribosomal rescue protein PELO as a vulnerability in chromosome 9p21-deleted and MSI cancers, opening new avenues for targeted therapy development.

In the upcoming third phase, the DMC aims to transcend conventional approaches by addressing therapeutic resistance—a formidable challenge undermining the efficacy of many cancer treatments. By employing cutting-edge multi-omics profiling and computational analytics, the consortium seeks to delineate the adaptive pathways that cancer cells exploit to evade therapy and identify novel intervention points. This strategy leverages the latest advances in system biology and bioinformatics to develop therapeutic options that anticipate and counteract resistance mechanisms.

A transformative element of DMC 3.0 is the systematic cataloging of cell surface proteins, critical for the advancement of biologics and cell-based therapies such as antibody-drug conjugates and CAR-T cells. Surface molecules represent accessible targets for these modalities, which can selectively bind and eradicate malignant cells while sparing normal tissues. This endeavor integrates proteomic analyses with functional assays, enabling a more expansive target landscape for next-generation immune and targeted therapies.

Integrating patient-derived data directly into preclinical models constitutes another innovative thrust in the consortium’s strategy. By incorporating real-world tumor material and data into model systems, researchers aim to enhance the translational relevance of discoveries and shorten the trajectory from bench to bedside. This approach enhances the predictive power of preclinical testing, thereby improving the likelihood of clinical success for emerging therapeutics.

The DMC also emphasizes the employment of high-dimensional, high-throughput screening technologies that capture multi-parametric cellular responses to perturbations. Such sophisticated readouts include imaging-based phenotypic assays and multiplexed biomarker analyses, which can uncover subtle but clinically significant vulnerabilities previously masked in conventional assays. This comprehensive data enables refined target prioritization and drug candidate profiling that take into account complex cellular contexts.

The consortium’s unprecedented industry-academic collaboration, involving a broad spectrum of pharmaceutical and biotechnology partners, underpins the scalability and impact of the work. By pooling resources, expertise, and data openly, the consortium creates a vibrant ecosystem that de-risks early-stage drug discovery and expedites the validation of novel targets. This collaborative framework not only accelerates therapeutic innovation but also ensures that high-value discoveries rapidly translate into clinical interventions.

The Cancer Dependency Map has moreover been credited as a keystone resource in the oncology community, serving stakeholders from academic researchers to biotech investors. Its comprehensive datasets and analytical tools provide a rare platform for hypothesis generation, target validation, and biomarker discovery, thus catalyzing numerous clinical programs and startup ventures. The integration of the PRISM drug screening platform notably accelerates compound evaluation by enabling vast chemical libraries to be tested simultaneously across diverse cancer models, dramatically increasing throughput and depth of discovery.

Looking ahead, the DMC envisions its roadmap as a guidepost for precision oncology over the next decade. The initiative strives to move beyond merely cataloging cancer susceptibilities toward actively enabling the development of safer, more effective medicines tailored to the molecular intricacies of individual tumors. This visionary effort, guided by leaders such as William Sellers and Francisca Vazquez, places the consortium at the forefront of precision cancer medicine innovation and promises to profoundly reshape therapeutic paradigms.

As cancer therapies evolve towards increasingly sophisticated modalities, the Broad Institute’s Cancer Dependency Map Consortium stands as a pioneering force driving this transformation. By merging functional genomics with systems biology, advanced modeling, and industry collaboration, the consortium is not only unraveling the complex biology of cancer but also forging tangible paths to clinical breakthroughs that will benefit patients worldwide.

Subject of Research: Cancer vulnerabilities and precision oncology target discovery
Article Title: Broad Institute Cancer Dependency Map Consortium Launches Third Phase to Accelerate Precision Cancer Therapeutics
News Publication Date: April 15, 2026
Web References:

• https://www.broadinstitute.org/news/broad-institute-launches-academic-industrial-consortium-cancer-dependency-studies
• https://www.broadinstitute.org/news/cancer-dependency-map-consortium-accelerates-research-tumor-vulnerabilities
• https://depmap.org/portal/home/#/
  Keywords: cancer dependencies, precision medicine, functional genomics, PRISM drug screening, synthetic lethality, tumor vulnerabilities, multi-omics, single-cell analysis, therapeutic resistance, cancer target discovery, cell surface proteins, patient-derived models