Find a Doctor

Basic/Laboratory: One of my top priorities is to identify and characterize lung cancer radiosensitizers. Standard treatment for locally advanced non-small cell lung cancer and small cell lung cancer involves radiation therapy and chemotherapy given together. Radiosensitizers are drugs that improve the ability of radiation to destroy tumors without damaging surrounding vital organs. To discover novel therapeutics with the potential to act as radiosensitizers, we have been performing genome-wide screens in lung cancer cells to identify genes whose loss increases the effect of radiation on the cancer cells. Once we identify promising gene targets, we test potential drugs and characterize their mechanisms of action, e.g., impact on DNA damage repair, to identify biomarkers that may predict treatment responses.

Clinical/Translational: I am an Executive Officer for the Alliance for Clinical Trials in Oncology, a North American research organization that develops and conducts cancer clinical trials. Ongoing studies include a randomized trial of the immunotherapy drug atezolizumab in combination with chemotherapy and radiation for limited stage small cell lung cancer and a randomized trial of highly focused (stereotactic) radiation therapy for advanced non-small cell lung cancer. I am also the Principal Investigator for the Brigham and Women's/Dana-Farber Radiation Oncology All-Department Biorepository to Accelerate New Discoveries (BROADBAND) protocol for systematic collection of health information, treatment data, blood samples and other biospecimens for translational studies.

Zhang H, Kozono DE, O'Connor KW, Vidal-Cardenas S, Rousseau A, Hamilton A, Moreau L, Gaudiano EF, Greenberger J, Bagby G, Soulier J, Grompe M, Parmar K, D'Andrea AD. TGF-β Inhibition Rescues Hematopoietic Stem Cell Defects and Bone Marrow Failure in Fanconi Anemia. Cell Stem Cell. 18(5):668-81.{line break}Publication Year: 2016

Dinh TK, Fendler W, Chałubińska-Fendler J, Acharya SS, O'Leary C, Deraska PV, D'Andrea AD, Chowdhury D, Kozono D. Circulating miR-29a and miR-150 correlate with delivered dose during thoracic radiation therapy for non-small cell lung cancer. Radiat Oncol. 11:61.{line break}Publication Year: 2016

Kushwaha D, O'Leary C, Cron KR, Deraska P, Zhu K, D'Andrea AD, Kozono D. USP9X inhibition promotes radiation-induced apoptosis in non-small cell lung cancer cells expressing mid-to-high MCL1. Cancer Biol Ther. 16(3):392-401.{line break}Publication Year: 2015

Kozono D, Li J, Nitta M, Sampetrean O, Gonda D, Kushwaha DS, Merzon D, Ramakrishnan V, Zhu S, Zhu K, Matsui H, Harismendy O, Hua W, Mao Y, Kwon CH, Saya H, Nakano I, Pizzo DP, VandenBerg SR, Chen CC. Dynamic epigenetic regulation of glioblastoma tumorigenicity through LSD1 modulation of MYC expression. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 112(30):E3055-64.{line break}Publication Year: 2015

Gazula A, Baldini EH, Chen A, Kozono D. Comparison of once and twice daily radiotherapy for limited stage small-cell lung cancer. Lung. 192(1):151-8.{line break}Publication Year: 2014

Herter-Sprie GS, Korideck H, Christensen CL, Herter JM, Rhee K, Berbeco RI, Bennett DG, Akbay EA, Kozono D, Mak RH, Mike Makrigiorgos G, Kimmelman AC, Wong KK. Image-guided radiotherapy platform using single nodule conditional lung cancer mouse models. Nat Commun. 18;5:5870.{line break}Publication Year: 2014

Cron KR, Zhu K, Kushwaha DS, Hsieh G, Merzon D, Rameseder J, Chen CC, D'Andrea AD, Kozono D. Proteasome inhibitors block DNA repair and radiosensitize non-small cell lung cancer. PLoS One. 8(9):e73710.{line break}Publication Year: 2013

Kang J, D'Andrea AD, Kozono D. A DNA repair pathway-focused score for prediction of outcomes in ovarian cancer treated with platinum-based chemotherapy. J Natl Cancer Inst. 104(9):670-81.{line break}Publication Year: 2012.