Samantha Hasenleithner, PhD

Samantha began in basic research at the University of Chicago’s Department of Radiation & Cellular Oncology studying the effects of ionizing radiation on signal transduction pathways and the role of microRNAs in metastasis. She completed her PhD in Molecular Medicine at the Institute of Human Genetics, Medical University of Graz, Austria, where she still currently works. For the last several years, her focus has been on translational applications of circulating tumor DNA analysis, including monitoring of treatment response, identifying novel driver genes as markers of resistance and matching drugs to actionable targets. At the Institute of Human Genetics, she acts as a scientific officer, responsible for the interpretation and communication of high-throughput next-generation sequencing data for both clinical partners and patients. She is one of the founders of Vessel, a platform providing career programs for medical professionals seeking to create impact in their genomics-driven approaches to precision oncology.

“The identification of tumor-specific actionable alterations has transformed the landscape of cancer therapeutics. However, the translation of complex molecular data from large panel sequencing into actionable insight within the context of individual patients has proven to be a formidable task. CureMatch is unique in its solution as it takes not only the entire molecular profile of the patient into account, but also previous lines of treatment and physician’s preference, which represents a new way of streamlining clinical decisions.”