Editorial Board
Mark LaBarge
Department of Cancer and DNA Damage Repair, Life Science Division, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory · United States
Editorial leadership for Journal of Breast Cancer Survival
Research interests
- Dr. Labarge's Team Specializes In Developing Human Cell Systems For Understanding Why Aging Is A Major Risk Factor For Breast Cancer. The Objectives Of His Research Program Are To Generate A Comprehensive Understanding Of The Micro-Environmental
- Tissue-Level Changes In Breast That Arise With Age
- And Then Develop A Functional Understanding Of How Those Changes: Alter Mammary Gland Homeostasis
- Contribute To Breast Tumor Genesis
- And Modulate Activity Of Therapeutics. A Cornerstone Of Their Approach Involves The Use Of A Growing Collection Of Primary Human Mammary Epithelial Cell (Hmec) Strains
- Dubbed The Hmec Aging Resource
- That Were Derived From Reduction Mammoplasty
- Mastectomy
- And Peripheral Tumor Dissections. They Explore The Functional Impact Of Aging On Various Lineages Of Hmec
- At Different Stages Of Cancer Progression
- By Probing Them With Combinatorial Bioengineered Culture Substrata
- Measuring Outcomes Quantitatively With Imaging
- Molecular Analyses. In Doing So
- They Continue To Derive A Catalog Of Micro-Environmental
- Epigenetic
- Genetic
- Cellular
- And Tissue-Level Changes That Occur Normally With Age
- And Are Trying To Determine Mechanistically Which Of Those Changes Increase The Vulnerability Of Older Women To Breast Cancer. Put Differently
- They Are Deriving A Growing List Of Potential Therapeutic Targets
- Biomarkers Of Breast Aging
- Breast Cancer Susceptibility. Dr. Labarge Says His Dream Is To Identify Primary Breast Cancer Prevention Modalities That Are So Safe
- They Become Common Place
Biography
- Dr. LaBarge received a B.S. in Genetics from UC Davis, and a Ph.D. in Molecular Pharmacology from Stanford University.
- He became passionate about the biology of breast cancer during his postdoctoral training at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, with his mentor Mina Bissell, Ph.D., where he was an American Cancer Society Fellow, and where he built novel high throughput cell-based systems for studying human mammary stem cell fate decisions in the contexts of combinatorial microenvironments.
- In 2009 he won a Transition to Independence Award from the National Institute on Aging and joined the LBNL faculty.
- In 2015 he was awarded the Era of Hope Scholar Award from the Congressionally Directed Medical Research Program to support his team's efforts to translate their laboratory findings into prevention-focused breast cancer therapeutics, which is a major focus of his current research.
Awards:
- 2005, American Cancer Society Postdoctoral Fellowship, American Cancer Society
- 2008, Future Leaders, New Directions Award, American Association for Cancer Research
- 2009, Transition to Independence Award, National Institute on Aging
- 2012, Future Leaders, New Directions in Aging Research, Gerontological Society of America
- 2015, Era of Hope Scholar Award, Department of Defence's Breast Cancer Research Program
Selected publications
- Evidence for accelerated aging in mammary epithelia of women carrying germline BRCA1 or BRCA2 mutations 2021 cited 76×
- Preneoplastic stromal cells promote BRCA1-mediated breast tumorigenesis 2023 cited 60×
- Comprehensive single-cell aging atlas of healthy mammary tissues reveals shared epigenomic and transcriptomic signatures of aging and cancer 2024 cited 40×
- Changes in Immune Cell Types with Age in Breast are Consistent with a Decline in Immune Surveillance and Increased Immunosuppression 2021 cited 35×
- Tissue aging: the integration of collective and variant responses of cells to entropic forces over time 2018 cited 32×
- AXL Is a Driver of Stemness in Normal Mammary Gland and Breast Cancer 2020 cited 30×
Ranked by citation impact (Crossref) where available, newest otherwise · verified via ORCID.
Considering JBCS for your work?
This journal is guided by Mark LaBarge (Department of Cancer and DNA Damage Repair, Life Science Division, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory) and a peer-review board of practising researchers. Open access, author-retained copyright (CC BY), and a clear editorial process.