Meet Dan Theodorescu of the recently established Science Advisory Board

• Dan Theodorescu is the Director of the NCI designated Comprehensive Cancer Center at the University of Colorado where he is also a Distinguished University Professor, incumbent of the Paul Bunn Chair in Cancer Research and Professor of Surgery (Urology) and Pharmacology. Dan is known for his work on the molecular mechanisms underlying bladder cancer and tools that determine drug response, as well as the discovery of new drugs for cancer.

• Examples include discovery of genes that regulate tumor growth and metastasis (RhoGDI2, AGL, GON4L) and novel biomarkers (DNA/NGS, RNA and proteomic) and concepts for precision therapeutic approaches such as the COXEN principle, that are currently being tested in national (SWOG) clinical trials. He also conceptualized the approach and then led the discovery and development of a “first in class” RalGTPase inhibitor as a new therapeutic in cancer. This drug is now in commercial development. His laboratory is funded by grants from the NIH-NCI.

• Dan has published over 300 articles including articles in Nature, Science, Cancer Cell, PNAS and JCI. He is the recipient of a number of awards, sits on several society boards and federal government committees and is the founding co-editor of Bladder Cancer, the first journal focused on this disease. He is an elected member of the American Society for Clinical Investigation (ASCI), the American Association of Genitourinary Surgeons (AAGUS), the American Surgical Association (ASA) and the National Academy of Medicine (NAM).

• Dan’s work was also recently nicely highlighted in an article in Nature https://www.nature.com/articles/551S44a Especially the last lines from this article where Dan compares his research work with being a surgeon resonate with us: “There’s the satisfaction of helping the human in front of you, seeing the sparkle in their eyes when you tell them you may be able to cure them, versus seeing an experiment that cures cancer in mice.” But he knows that those cured mice could be just the first step on a much longer, but ultimately more rewarding, journey.

• Dan appeared very pleased during our last meeting with the company and the rest of the Science Advisory Board, saying “Machavert is an innovative company with a potentially game-changing product for cancer treatment. The latest preclinical results I saw are very promising.” We are very happy that Dan is going to support us in reaching our goal of turning this novel anti-cancer approach into a reality for patients!