Dean
Felsher MD, PhD

Clinical Advisor, Translational Oncology

Dean W Felsher, MD, PhD is the Director of Translational Research and Applied Medicine at Stanford University School of Medicine and Professor in the Division of Oncology, Departments of Medicine and Pathology at Stanford University. Dr Felsher’s laboratory pursues both basic science and translational research studies investigating how oncogenes initiate and sustain tumorigenesis and uses these insights towards the development of new therapies for cancer. 

He has pioneered strategies utilizing the Tetracycline regulatory system to develop conditional transgenic mouse model systems of tumorigenesis. To date, he established a paradigm suggesting that the inactivation of the single oncogene, MYC, can be sufficient to reverse the process of tumorigenesis, in lymphoma, leukemia, osteogenic sarcoma and hepatocellular carcinoma. Even genomically complex tumors were found to regress upon MYC inactivation. Dr Felsher’s work has led to major contributions to our understanding of the molecular basis of cancer and useful towards the rational development of new therapeutics to treat cancer. 

He obtained his BA in Chemistry at the University of Chicago and his MD PhD from the University of California, Los Angeles. He conducted his Oncology Fellowship training at the University of California San Francisco.