Who We Are

Cathy Eng, M.D. F.A.C.P.

Professor of Medicine
Co-Leader, VICC Gastrointestinal Cancer Research Program
David H. Johnson Chair in Surgical and Medical Oncology
Co-Director, GI Oncology
Director, VICC Young Adults Program
Vice Chair, SWOG GI Committee

Cathy Eng, MD, FACP, FASCO, Professor of Medicine, Hematology and Oncology, is the Co-Director of GI Oncology and Co-Leader of the Gastrointestinal Cancer Research Program. She joined the faculty at Vanderbilt-Ingram Cancer Center in July 2019.

Her primary clinical research interests include clinical trials involving innovative drugs for the treatment of colorectal, anal, and appendiceal cancers. She has a specific interest in young colorectal cancer patients as well as the role of immunotherapy in HPV-associated cancers. She has published multiple publications in these GI malignancies.

Nationally, Dr. Eng has served in multiple leadership roles for ASCO, ASCO GI, ECOG, and the NCI Rectal/Anal Task Force. She has most recently been chosen to serve as the Vice-Chair for the SWOG GI Committee and the NCI GI Steering Committee.

Dr. Paul A Fox, MA, F.R.C.P

Consultant Physician in HIV and GU Medicine
Ealing Hospital

Paul has a long standing interest in HPV. He studied medicine at Cambridge University, graduating in 1987. He has worked at the Chelsea and Westminster Hospital since 1996, where he became concerned in the late 1990s by a rising tide of anal cancer in HIV positive patients. This led him in 1999 to study the technique of High Resolution Anoscopy at the University of California in San Francisco under Professor Joel Palefsky, and to set up his own AIN research and treatment clinic. He receives referrals to this clinic from across the United Kingdom. Publications include numerous papers and articles on HPV, AIN and anal cancer, topics which he also teaches on  the national diploma course in sexual health. He is a longstanding member of the HPV special interest group of BASHH, has contributed to national guidelines on HPV management, and has worked in an advisory capacity with the National Cancer Screening Committee. He is an Honorary Senior Lecturer at Imperial College School of Medicine.

Karyn Aalami Goodman, MD

Professor and Vice Chair of Research
Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai

Karyn Aalami Goodman, MD, MS is a Professor and Vice Chair for Research and Quality in the Department of Radiation Oncology at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai. She is also Associate Director for Clinical Research at The Tisch Cancer Institute. Dr. Goodman is an internationally recognized expert in gastrointestinal (GI) cancers and has served in numerous leadership roles on committees to establish national treatment guidelines and best practices for the American Society of Clinical Oncology, the American Society for Radiation Oncology, and the American College of Radiology. She is involved in developing and leading clinical trials for novel approaches to GI cancers. Her research focuses on improving outcomes and reducing toxicity in patients with GI malignancies. She is involved in the development of therapeutic protocols combining radiation, chemotherapy, targeted agents, and immunotherapy for gastrointestinal cancers. Her experience as principal investigator on clinical trials is extensive, and she has received numerous grant awards. She currently serves as the Co-Chair of the National Cancer Institute (NCI) Gastrointestinal Steering Committee where she helps to set the strategic priorities for the development of Phase II and III clinical trials in GI cancers conducted through the National Clinical Trials Network (NCTN).

Dr. Goodman received her undergraduate and medical degrees from Stanford University and an MS in Epidemiology from the Harvard School of Public Health. She completed an internship in Internal Medicine at Stanford and residency training at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center. She was on the faculty at Stanford University from 2004-2006 and then was the head of Gastrointestinal Radiation Oncology at Memorial Sloan Kettering from 2007-2015. She has published over 200 peer-reviewed scientific articles, review articles, and chapters.

Paul F. Lambert, Ph.D.

Professor of Oncology
University of Wisconsin, School of Medicine and Public Health
McArdle Laboratory for Cancer Research

Paul F. Lambert, PhD received his undergraduate degree in biochemistry from the University of Massachusetts, and his PhD in biochemistry from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. After pursuing postdoctoral training at the National Cancer Institute in Bethesda under Dr. Peter Howley on papillomavirus research, he joined the faculty in the McArdle Laboratory for Cancer Research (Dept of Oncology) at the University of Wisconsin, where he has been on the faculty for 20 years. There he heads a laboratory focused on the study of human papillomaviruses associated with cancers including anal, cervical and head/neck cancers. His lab has generated many mouse models for HPV-associated cancers including that of the anus. His lab’s research is primarily funded by the National Institutes of Health, which supports the lab with five research grants. In addition, he is the director of the Cancer Biology Graduate program at the University and is editor of Virology.

Karl Munger, Ph.D.

Department of Developmental, Molecular and Chemical Biology
Tufts University School of Medicine

Karl Munger PhD obtained his degree in Biochemistry from the University of Zurich, Switzerland, followed by a postdoctoral fellowship at the National Cancer Institute in Bethesda, MD. He has been a faculty member at Harvard Medical School since 1993 and is currently an Associate Professor at the Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Department of Medicine, Harvard Medical School. The research efforts of his laboratory are focused on delineating the molecular mechanisms of human papillomavirus (HPV)-associated cancer development. He has published more than 150 articles and has been recognized as one of the most highly cited scientists in the area of Microbiology by the Institute of Scientific Information (ISI). He serves on the Editorial Boards of Molecular Cancer, the International Journal of Cancer, Genes and Cancer, Virology and the Journal of Virology. He is also an Associate Editor for Cancer Biology and Therapy and a Section Editor for PLoS Pathogens. Dr. Munger has been regularly participating on grant review panels since 1995 and is currently a member of the Virology B study section (NIH). He has served as the basic science section chair of an advisory panel for the World Health Organization (WHO) and on a committee of the National Toxicology Program, which officially designated HPVs as carcinogenic agents in humans. His current research is supported by grants from the National Institutes of Health.

Joel Palefsky, M.D., C.M., F.R.C.P.(C)

Professor of Medicine
University of California, San Francisco
Division of Infectious Diseases

Joel Palefsky, M.D., C.M., F.R.C.P.(C). completed his undergraduate medical training and training in Internal Medicine at McGill University and completed his fellowship in Infectious Diseases at Stanford University in 1989. He then joined the faculty at the University of California San Francisco School of Medicine, where he remains to this day.

Joel is an internationally recognized expert on the molecular biology, treatment, pathogenesis and natural history of anogenital human papillomavirus infections, particularly in the setting of HIV infection. He is the director of the world’s first clinic devoted to prevention of anal cancer, the Anal Neoplasia Clinic Research and Education Center at the UCSF Cancer Center. He is the vice-chair of the National Cancer Institute (NCI)-supported AIDS Malignancy Consortium. He is the chair of the Anal Cancer /HSIL Outcomes Research (ANCHOR) Study, a national multi-site NIH study designed to determine whether treatment of anal cancer precursor lesions prevents the development of anal cancer and to identify biomarkers of progression. He is founder and past president of the International Anal Neoplasia Society and is past president of the International Papillomavirus Society. He is the founder and chairperson of the IPVS International HPV Awareness Day Campaign.

Paul Romesser, M.D.

Dr. Romesser is the Director of Colorectal Anal Cancer in the Department of Radiation Oncology at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, where he was Chief Resident. He is a physician scientist with an interest in developing novel radiation sensitizers for colorectal anal cancers. He is a member of the NRG Oncology colorectal and non-colorectal committees and the NCI Colon Task Force. His work has been published in the New England Journal of Medicine, Nature, Science, Cell, Journal of Clinical Oncology, Lancet Oncology, Clinical Cancer Research, International Journal of Radiation Oncology and Biophysics, and Cancer.

Professor Margaret Stanley OBE

Professor of Epithelial Biology
Department of Pathology
University of Cambridge

Margaret has served on several research council committees and was a member of the Biology and Biotechnology Science Research Council from 2000-2003, as well as a member of the Spongiform Encephalopathies Advisory Committee (SEAC) which advised the UK government on prion diseases. In 2004, she was awarded the OBE for services to Virology, before being made a Fellow of the Academy of Medical Sciences in 2005. Her research interests have always concerned the biology of cervical epithelium and how and why cancer of the cervix develops. Her current research focuses on mechanisms of host defence and the development of vaccines and immunotherapies against human papillomaviruses (HPV), the cause of cervical cancer as well as a rising cause of throat cancers. She has published extensively in peer-reviewed journals, and has given 45 keynote or plenary presentations at national and international meetings on these topics in the last five years. She is currently on the Editorial Board of Sexually Transmitted Infections and Reviews in Medical Virology.