Liewei Wang, M.D., Ph.D.

My research program is focused on the pharmacogenomics of anti-cancer drugs. Pharmacogenomics is a study of role of genetic variation in variation in drug response.

We have developed an in vitro cell-based system that consists of 300 cell lines with the incorporation of high through put modern genomic technology to help identify biomarkers that might be useful to predict clinical response and select responsive patients for a given treatment.

In addition, we will pursue the mechanisms underlying the association and identify potential new drug target, i.e., from bench to bedside. At the same time, we will try to apply this system to understand the biology underlying the association resulted from the genetic variation and clinical response phenotypes, i.e. from bedside to bench.

Current projects include:

1. Identify and understand the role of genetic variation in variation in response to cytidine analogue (gemcitabine and AraC) treatment.
2. Clinical genotype-phenotype association studies (Genome-wide association study) with breast cancer patients who were treated with chemotherapeutic agents of interest to identify genetic variation that might help predict response to the chemotherapy used in breast cancer.
3. Understand the mechanisms by which FKBP5, a gene identified to play an important role in chemoresistance from our genome-wide screening using the 300 cell lines, regulate the AKT pathway and response to chemotherapy.
4. Identify and understand the role of genetic variation in variation in response to radiation therapy using a genome-wide approach of our 300 cell lines.
5. Identify and understand the role of genetic variation in variation in response to platinum compounds using a genome-wide approach of our 300 cell lines and lung cancer patients.