Progress, Potential, and Possibilities Podcast / Show Dr. Ashani Weeraratna, Ph.D. - Exploring The Aging-Cancer Connection - Johns Hopkins - NCAB
Dr. Ashani Weeraratna, Ph.D., (https://publichealth.jhu.edu/faculty/3918/ashani-t-weeraratna) is Bloomberg Distinguished Professor, Chair, Biochemistry & Molecular Biology, and Professor, Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. Dr. Weeraratna is also a recently appointed member (by President Joe Biden), of the National Cancer Advisory Board (https://deainfo.nci.nih.gov/advisory/ncab/ncab.htm), which advises and assists the director of the National Cancer Institute on the activities of the national cancer program. Dr. Weeraratna is a groundbreaking researcher exploring crucial questions about the role aging plays in cancer and her findings on age-related differences in responses to both targeted therapy and immuno-therapy for cancer are leading to a change in clinical practice. Dr. Weeraratna studies the molecular mechanisms involved in metastasis and how tumor micro-environments affect melanoma progression and therapy resistance. She is interested in how the aging micro-environment guides changes leading to increased metastasis and therapy resistance, as well as cell-autonomous aspects of therapy resistance. Dr. Weeraratna’s research also encompasses biophysical changes that affect the ability of both tumor and immune cells to migrate. She has demonstrated that normal age-related changes in the micro-environment can contribute to multiple aspects of melanoma formation and development as well as therapy resistance. Dr. Weeraratna’s work in melanoma prevention includes a public health approach. She recently helped lead a campaign to introduce sunblock dispensers throughout Philadelphia and talk to children about the dangers of tanning. Dr. Weeraratna is also the author of Is Cancer Inevitable? which clearly describes cancer’s mechanisms and how teams like hers are finding ways to reduce its deadly impacts. The book is part of the Johns Hopkins Wavelengths series. Dr. Weeraratna joined Johns Hopkins University as a Bloomberg Distinguished Professor in 2019 from the Wistar Institute where she established her lab back in 2011, and prior to that was at the National Institute on Aging, since 2003. Dr. Weeraratna earned a doctorate in Molecular and Cellular Oncology from George Washington University Medical Center and completed post-graduate training and was a postdoctoral fellow in experimental therapeutics and pharmacology at the Johns Hopkins Sidney Kimmel Comprehensive Cancer Center, then known as the Johns Hopkins Oncology Center.