By Vinay Tergaonkar, PhD, and Wai Leong Tam, PhD, cochairs of the Frontiers in Cancer Science 2024 conference
Singapore will hold its 16th Frontiers in Cancer Science (FCS) conference from November 13- 15, 2024, at the Matrix at Biopolis, Singapore. This annual conference started in 2009 as a one-day symposium dedicated to the purpose of stimulating the growth of the regional community of cancer researchers, and their links with international colleagues. Since its inception, FCS has grown into a major international cancer conference in the Asia-Pacific region, and the largest of its kind in Singapore, with over 500 participants registering annually. Since 2020, we have partnered with the American Association for Cancer Research (AACR) to concurrently hold the AACR-FCS Education Sessions, the first of their kind in Southeast Asia. Prepare for this year by viewing highlights of the previous FCS conferences.
FCS 2024 brings together a stellar list of international and regional speakers covering many current trends in cancer research, spanning basic science and clinical research with selected thematic focus on immuno-oncology, genomics, metabolism, and AI. Young investigators will have an opportunity to showcase their work as posters, and talks selected from outstanding poster abstracts will also be presented at the Lightning Talk sessions. Prizes for the best posters will include two travel awards (each worth US$2,500) to support travel to the AACR Annual Meeting 2025. This year, we gave out 10 “Outstanding FCS Abstract Travel Awards” to selected abstracts from international participants to help cover their expenses for attendance at FCS.
The AACR-FCS Education Sessions, initiated in 2020, have enjoyed a high level of participation and positive feedback from FCS participants. These sessions aim to provide graduate students, postdoctoral researchers, and early-career basic or clinical investigators with a broader view of key topics in contemporary cancer research, presented by international opinion leaders. At FCS 2024, the AACR-FCS Education Sessions will include presentations from Zemin Zhang, PhD, (Peking University), Katy Rezvani, MD, PhD, (MD Anderson Cancer Center) and Sarah-Maria Fendt, PhD, (VIB-KU Leuven Center for Cancer Biology), recipient of the 2024 AACR Award for Outstanding Achievement in Basic Cancer Research.
FCS is jointly organized by the Cancer Science Institute of Singapore; Duke-NUS Medical School; Genome Institute of Singapore; Institute of Molecular and Cell Biology; Lee Kong Chian School of Medicine/Nanyang Technological University; National Cancer Centre Singapore; National University Cancer Institute, Singapore; and Yong Loo Lin School of Medicine, National University of Singapore.
View the program highlights for this year’s exciting international conference from Singapore, as well as information about registration and abstract submission.
We warmly welcome you to Frontiers in Cancer Science 2024 and hope to see you in Singapore!
Vinay Tergaonkar obtained his PhD through an international cancer society fellowship for collaborative research at Tufts University, Boston, Massachusetts. He has been a fellow (2001-2004) and a special fellow (2004-2006) of the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society of America and conducted his postdoctoral studies at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies, La Jolla, California. He joined the Institute of Molecular and Cell Biology, Singapore, in late 2005 as principal investigator and became a senior principal investigator in 2010 and research director in 2015. Since 2022, he is a distinguished fellow. He is also a professor, School of Medicine at National University of Singapore. Work from his laboratory has led to his inclusion (by Stanford University) in the top 2 % of the most cited scientists globally, and international recognitions including the British Council development award (2014), the Premier’s fellowship from Government of South Australia (2015), and distinguished visiting professorships at Ashoka University and University of Macau. He serves on Editorial Boards of Science Advances, Molecular and Cellular Biology (American Society for Molecular Biology), and Biochemical Journal (Portland Press).
Wai Leong Tam, PhD, is the deputy executive director of the Genome Institute of Singapore, Singapore’s flagship genome science institute spearheading the innovation of genomics for improving Singaporean lives and health, where he oversees the precision medicine effort to understand the genetic and genomic underpinnings of health and disease. Concurrently, he is a faculty member at the Cancer Science Institute of Singapore, National University of Singapore. As a cancer biologist, he develops and applies genome-scale functional genomic approaches to discover the molecular drivers and targets of cancer progression in Asian-specific (lung and liver) and Asian-prevalent (breast and colorectal) cancers. His research delves into elucidating the precise control of cellular plasticity during cancer initiation, invasion, and metastasis. This has led to key insights on how metabolic reprograming, including influences from the tumor microenvironment and diet, underpins malignant cell states, and how targeting oncogenic metabolic pathways may be exploited to restrain cellular plasticity and thwart cancer cell adaptation. He was a recipient of the prestigious National Research Foundation Fellowship, and a current recipient of the National Research Foundation Investigatorship.
