Steven Van Laere, PhD

Research and Clinical Interests

IBC-Focused Research

Within the fields of computational biology and bioinformatics, I seek to apply computer algorithms and mathematical methods to answer questions in biology and medicine—specifically in studies of human genetics and genomics. My research centers on four main areas of interest:

1. Defining the molecular signature, and investigating the immune microenvironment in preclinical models and patients samples of inflammatory breast cancer. I do this by using computational analysis of mRNA and phosphopeptide profiling data in combination with automated image analysis.

2. Establishing a molecular signature for the replacement growth pattern of liver metastases of colorectal adenocarcinomas, in order to elucidate the underlying molecular biology, as well as to identify biomarkers that can be used in clinical practice. Additionally, performing single cell RNA-sequencing of endothelial cells harvested from preclinical models under various stages of anti-angiogenic therapy in order to understand the role of angiocrine signaling in mediating resistance to anti-angiogenic therapy.

3. Establishing the complete transcriptional profile of single circulating tumor cells from patients with castration-resistant prostate cancer, in order to investigate the transcriptional intra-patient heterogeneity and study the biological properties of these cells that allow their survival in the bloodstream.

4. Analyzing genomic and transcriptomic profiles of breast cancers to define integrated subtype-specific molecular profiles.