Faculty Research

Bapsi Chakravarthy, MD, FASTRO

     Dr Chakravarthy's research interests include the development of novel ways to combine radiation with radiosensitizing chemotherapy in the treatment of cancers of the gastrointestinal tract including malignancies of the esophagus, stomach, pancreas anus and rectum. Nationally, Dr Chak is an active member of the Eastern Cooperative Oncology Group- American College of Radiology Imaging Network (ECOG-ACRIN) GI committee and the NCI-Colorectal Working Group where she helps to design trials at the national level. Dr Chakravarthy collaborates with both basic scientists as well as imaging scientists to develop markers (at the blood and tissue level as well as imaging biomarkers) that can predict ultimate patient outcomes in breast cancer.
     Click here for a Pubmed link for a list of publications.

Anthony Cmelak, MD

     Dr Cmelak's research focuses on the treatment of head and neck cancers using cutting edge chemo-radiation-personalized medicine approaches. He is a recognized leader in cancer treatments utilizing radiation therapy with novel chemotherapy agents in head and neck cancers, human papillomavirus, and provides comprehensive radiation treatment for patients with head and neck cancers and brain tumors, using the latest technologies including stereotactic radiosurgery and stereotactic body radiotherapy. Dr. Cmelak has been the Clinical Track Team Leader for Head and Neck Cancers for ASCO in 2014 and 2015, and on the Scientific Review Committee. He is a member of the Head and Neck Core Committee for the ECOG-ACRIN and a Head and Neck Committee member on the NCCN. He is the Principal Investigator in Head and Neck carcinomas and Intracranial Neoplasms at Vanderbilt University where he trains residents in these disciplines and in conducting clinical trials, and participates in multidisciplinary conferences and specialty clinics in these areas. He has also been the Institution’s lead investigator in stereotactic radiosurgery since 1996, and has developed new technologies and treatment strategies for a number of disease processes, both benign and malignant, including radiosurgery for essential tremor and Parkinson's tremor, trigeminal neuralgia, and for skull based tumors. He has authored over a hundred publications on new techniques and treatment outcomes.
     Click here for a Pubmed link for a list of publications.

Austin Kirschner, MD, PhD

     Dr Kirschner's central theme of research is the study of cancer biology mechanisms with focus on developing new cancer treatments, especially for locally advanced and metastatic cancers that have limited treatments. he believes new cancer therapies should be targeted to specific cancer pathways to limit their toxicity and side effects, while providing effective treatment. He is a physician-scientist treating cancer patients in a department of radiation oncology and perform basic science and translational research investigating new cancer therapies and mechanisms. Ultimately, his goal is to directly translate his research findings into clinical trials with patients. His current research focuses on prostate cancer, since there is a significant clinical deficit: nearly 30,000 men die from prostate cancer each year in the USA, making it the #2 cause of cancer death in men (world-wide: 1.1 million diagnosed and 307,000 deaths). One research project studies a core mechanism in prostate cancer involving the oncogene PIM1 kinase, which has been implicated in numerous human malignancies, making it an important drug target for directed cancer therapy. His work has revealed PIM1-related mechanistic details in prostate cancer and demonstrates the efficacy of PIM1-directed inhibition for the treatment of prostate cancer. He also studies the resistance to current cancer-directed therapies and the use of new targeted drugs to improve the effectiveness hormone therapy (androgen deprivation therapy), radiation therapy, and chemotherapy.
     Click here for a Pubmed link for a list of publications.

Natalie Lockney, MD

     Dr. Lockney's research interests include supportive care for head and neck cancer patients as well as the identification of biomarkers to predict tumor control and normal tissue toxicity
     Click here for a Pubmed link for a list of publications.

Leo Luo, MD

     Dr. Luo's research is focused on the understanding of the effect of radiation on patient and tumor genomes and translating significant findings into clinic through novel radiation therapies. He is a receipient of the Vanderbilt Clinical Oncology Research Career Development Program Award (VCORCDP K12) to study clinical hematopoiesis of indeterminate potential (CHIP) after cancer therapy and its effect on therapy-based leukemias and cardiovascular diseases. In addition to translational research, he is an active member on the Soft Tissue Sarcoma Committee of Children's Oncology Group (COG) and has published multiple manuscripts related to the outcomes of pediatric rhabdomyosarcoma. He is also co-PI on several prospective clinical trials including a study on hypofractionated preoperative radiation for adult soft tissue sarcomas.
     Click here for a Pubmed link for a list of publications.

Evan Osmundson, MD, PhD

     Dr Osmundson's research focuses on identifying therapy predictive and prognostic markers to improve risk stratification algorithms, adapt current cancer therapies, and monitor treatment response and toxicities in patients with lung and other cancers.   He is the Principal Investigator on several investigator-initiated clinical trials designed to enhance the synergy between radiation therapy and immunotherapy, and is the Vanderbilt site lead on several national clinical trials.  He is an active participant in national organizations that help define the standard of care for cancer patients and guide new areas of research direction.  
     Click here for a Pubmed link for a list of publications.

Ashwin Shinde, MD

     Dr. Shinde's research interest is in comparative effectiveness research and improvement of patient outcomes, especially in controversial clinical scenarios without effective guidelines to management. He has co-authored over 30 manuscripts/editorials and has been the first author on over 20 of those.
     Click here for a Pubmed link for a list of publications.

Eric Shinohara, MD, MSCI

     Dr Shinohara's research interests include improving outcomes and reducing side effects using devices and refinements to current radiation techniques as well as examining new indications for radiation
     Click here for a Pubmed link for a list of publications.

Ryan Whitaker, MD, PhD

     Dr. Whitaker's primary research interest is in the biological interplay between radiotherapy and immunotherapy to develop novel strategies for the treatment of lung cancer and other malignancies. From 2020 - 2021, Dr. Whitaker served as the ASTRO-AstraZeneca Industry Fellow where he worked as a member of a team focused on the development and implementation of AstraZeneca's immunotherapy agents in non-small cell and small cell lung cancer. 
     Click here for a Pubmed link for a list of publications.

Karen Winkfield, MD, PhD

     Dr. Winkfield is a national expert in community engagement with research focused on the design and implementation of programming to reduce sociocultural and economic barriers that contribute to disparate health outcomes for racial/ethnic minorities and underserved populations. In September 2021, Dr. Winkfield was appointed by U.S. president Joe Biden to a six-year term on the National Cancer Advisory Board. She serves as Executive Director of the Meharry-Vanderbilt Alliance.
     Click here for a Pubmed link for a list of publications.

Mahmoud Ahmed, PhD

     Dr Ahmed's research focuses in physics, including EPID dosimetry, development of real-time QA methods, treatment plans optimization, image-guided and adaptive radiotherapy, and implementation of innovative/computational techniques in radiation oncology.
     Click here for a Pubmed link for a list of publications.

George Ding, PhD

     Dr Ding's research focuses in physics. His research interests include: accurate patient treatment planning, accurate dose calibration for radiation beams, quality assurance (QA) in reference dosimetry and patient treatment planning systems, Image Guided Radiation Therapy (IGRT), adaptive radiotherapy, stereotactic body radiation therapy (SBRT), reducing imaging guidance dose to patients, application of highly accurate Monte Carlo techniques in patient dose calculations, small-field dosimetry, developing new treatment delivery techniques using electrons and photon beams, developing accurate and practical dose calculation algorithms for low energy photon beams..
     Click here for a Pubmed link for a list of publications.

John Eley, PhD

     Dr Eley's research focuses on the design and preclinical testing of experimental radiation treatment strategies that aim to reduce the severity of treatment side effects for cancer patients receiving radiotherapy, most recently in the context of brain cancer and neurologic side effects. His research interests include particle therapy, microbeam therapy, ultra-high-dose-rate radiation, computational radiation transport, and the radiobiologic experiments necessary to build biologic evidence for new therapy ideas prior to initiating human trials. He has several years of experience with experimental use of high-energy particle beams of protons and carbon ions, recently also with helium and lithium ions, and clinical experience with proton therapy. His work often requires cross-disciplinary expertise and overlaps in the fields of physics, radiation oncology, neurobiology, neurosurgery, pediatric medicine, radiology, applied mathematics, and computer science.
His experience was mainly gained at Louisiana State University in Baton Rouge, the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, the GSI Helmholtz Center for Heavy Ion Research in Darmstadt, Germany, and the University of Maryland School of Medicine in Baltimore, all of which are leading institutions in the world for particle therapy research. Dr. Eley belongs to the American Association of Physicists in Medicine and the Radiation Research Society. His research has led to several manuscripts in peer-reviewed journals and oral presentations at international meetings.
     Click here for a Pubmed link for a list of publications.

Michael Freeman, PhD

     Dr Freeman's research focuses in biology. Radiation Oncology leverages cutting edge advancements in physics and engineering for the treatment of cancer. Co-registration of diagnostic data sets into a coherent 3D-treatment plan allows individualized precision tumor targeting. Radiation oncology has the potential to provide outstanding personalized cancer treatment. However, cancer cell radioresistance and normal tissue injury represent two important limitations that can limit the ability of ionizing radiation to provide local/regional control of tumor growth. To addresses these limitations our laboratory initiated a cancer drug discovery program that seeks to develop efficacious radiation sensitizers. Two-indol-3-yl-methylenequinuclidin-3-ols and 5-((N-benzyl-1H-indol-3-yl)-methylene)pyrimidine-2,4,6(1H,3H,5H) trione have been synthesized and are currently being evaluated using defined DNA substrates, cell-based and murine mouse models. Elucidating the underlying mechanisms that drive the pathophysiology of normal tissue injury produced by ionizing radiation is also a focus of this laboratory. A holistic approach is used that encompasses well defined biochemical assays, cell-based assays such as ChIP Exo and transcriptome profiling, as well as GEMMs.
     Click here for a Pubmed link for a list of publications.

Manuel Morales-Paliza, PhD

     Dr Morales's research focuses in physics. Dr. Morales’ clinical and research interests in medical physics include: Stereotactic radiosurgery (SRS), intraoperative electronic brachytherapy (IORT), radiochromic film dosimetry, physical modeling of novel dosimeters, international collaborations for low-cost radiation oncology techniques and education. He serves as a reviewer in several medical physics and physics journals. He has authored more than 40 publications including peer-reviewed journals, proceedings, book chapters and abstracts in physics, engineering, and medical physics.
     Click here for a Pubmed link for a list of publications.

Adam Yock, PhD

     Dr Yock's research focuses in Image-Guided and Adaptive Radiation Therapy (IGRT and ART), Stereotactic Radiosurgery and Stereotactic Body Radiation Therapy (SRS and SBRT), Morphometric analysis for radiation oncology applications, Radiation therapy treatment plan robustness analysis, Interdisciplinary and international collaborations for innovative radiation oncology techniques, technologies, and workflows.
     Click here for a Pubmed link for a list of publications.