Sessions
Immunology and Inflammation
10:45 AM - 11:45 AM Thu
Dr. Barker directs strategic planning and strategic scientific initiatives for the Ellison Institute to advance our fundamental understanding of complex diseases such as cancer and drive the development of innovative technologies. Previously, she served as the principal deputy director of the National Cancer Institute (NCI) where she led the development and implementation of foundational platforms and national network programs, such as The Cancer Genome Atlas (TCGA), Clinical Proteomics Tumor Analysis Consortium (CPTAC), the NCI National Alliance for Nanotechnology in Cancer, and the Physical-Sciences Oncology Centers) to support the emerging concept of precision medicine. Hallmarks of these strategic, innovative programs were networks of global institutions, team science, and publicly available data.
Dr. Barker also was founding co-chair of the NCI-FDA Interagency Task Force, which lists among its accomplishments, the development of the exploratory IND. Working with FDA leadership and the principal investigators, she as co-chaired the team that designed and launched the ISPY 2 trial for high-risk breast cancer; and continues to serve as the Chair of the ISPY 2 Oversight Committee. Post NCI, Dr. Barker served as Director of Transformative Healthcare Networks, co-director of Complex Adaptive Systems -Biomedicine (CAS), and professor, School of Life Sciences at Arizona State University (ASU), where she maintains a courtesy academic appointment in Complex Systems. At ASU, she employed CAS approaches through “knowledge networks” to enable progress in areas ranging from clinical trial designs to biomarker discovery and applying concepts from the physical sciences to fundamentally understand and control complex diseases such as cancer. Dr. Barker spent several years at Battelle Memorial Institute, a nonprofit transdisciplinary research organization, where she led developed and led a large research and development group working in areas ranging from drug discovery to chemistry and biotechnology and progressed from a research scientist to serve in several senior executive roles. She also co-founded a drug development biotechnology company that became public in 1994. She has received numerous awards for her contributions to cancer research, cancer patients and advocates, professional organizations, and the national effort to prevent and cure cancer. Dr. Barker received her MA and PhD from the Ohio State University.