Valerie Shiwen YANG

Translational Precision Oncology Laboratory
BSc (First Class Honours), MBBChir (Cambridge), PhD (Cambridge), MRCP (UK), FAMS (Medical Oncology, Clinician Scientists) 
 

SUMMARY
Valerie Yang is a Clinician Scientist, with joint appointments as a Research Clinician and Principal Investigator of the Translational Precision Oncology Laboratory in the Institute of Molecular and Cell Biology (IMCB), Agency for Science, Technology and Research (A*STAR)and as and a Consultant Medical Oncologist (subspecialist in Sarcomas, Lymphomas, Melanomas and Rare Cancers) at the National Cancer Centre Singapore (NCCS) . She is also an Assistant Professor in the Oncology Academic Clinical Program at Duke-NUS Medical School.

Valerie received the A*STAR National Science Scholarship , which granted her a full scholarship to study Science, Medicine and a PhD. She graduated from the Royal Free and University College Medical School with a Distinction in Preclinical Medicine, as well as First Class Honours for a Bachelor of Science (BSc) in Molecular Medicine. She was conferred the Cluff Memorial Prize and the Goldberg-Schachmann and Freda Becker Memorial Award, and joined the A*STAR Chairman’s Honours List. 

Valerie then continued with Clinical Medicine at the University of Cambridge on the prestigious MB/PhD Programme. Her PhD was supervised by Professor Ronald Laskey, CBE, FRS, where she studied DNA replication, cell cycle regulation and embryonic stem cell pluripotency. Valerie won the first prize for her PhD work in Cambridge University’s Graduate Research Symposium, a competition among all Life Science PhD candidates in Cambridge University. This work also led to several publications, as well as oral presentations, including the Cold Spring Harbour Laboratory Conference, the Sylvia Lawler Prize Meeting at the Royal Society of Medicine, as well as an invitation to speak at the Chromatin, Chromosomal Stability and Genome Maintenance Conference held in Copenhagen. She also held a teaching position in the Cambridge University School of Medicine as an Associate Clinical Supervisor. 

Upon her return to Singapore, Valerie commenced her post-graduate clinical training as a junior doctor. She underwent residency training in Internal Medicine and was accepted to the Membership of the Royal College of Physicians (MRCP), UK, and completed specialty training in Medical Oncology at the National Cancer Centre Singapore. She is accredited as a Specialist in Medical Oncology, a Fellow of the Chapter of Medical Oncologists and a Fellow of the College of Clinician Scientists, Academy of Medicine of Singapore. She was also a fellow of the Esco Ventures X-A*STAR “Morphosis” program in biotechnology venture creation.

Valerie has won several independent grants as Principal Investigator. She is also an Editor for Frontiers in Oncology and has been invited as a reviewer for Advanced Drug Delivery Reviews, Human Molecular Genetics, Cancers, NPJ Precision Medicine and multiple other clinical journals. Internationally, she is part of the Asian Clinical Trials Network (ATLAS) for Sarcomas & Rare Cancers, the Global Connective Tissue Oncology Society (CTOS), the Asian Sarcoma Consortium and the Translational Research Committee of the Global Ultra-Rare Sarcoma Workgroup and the PUSH Sarcoma Global Initiative. 

Valerie is on the Advisory Board for Sarcomas at Boehringer Ingelheim. In Singapore, she chairs the biennial SingHealth Sarcoma & Skin Cancers Symposium and SingHealth Sarcoma Preceptorship. She is the main Principal Investigator of the nationwide Singapore Sarcoma & Skin Cancer Study and the Singapore Translational Cancer Consortium (STCC) SPACER program for Sarcomas and STCC’s tumor workgroup. 

Last but not least, Valerie is mentor to A*STAR MB/PhD scholars at the A*STAR Graduate Academy, SingHealth Internal Medicine and Medical Oncology trainees, medical students, as well as NUS & NTU undergraduates and PhD students.


AWARDS & GRANTS
  • 2024: SingHealth Duke-NUS Oncology Academic Clinical Programme Sarcoma Research Fund
  • 2024: National Medical Research Council Open Fund – Large Collaborative Grant (NMRC-OF-LCG)
  • 2023: The Terry Fox International Research Grant
  • 2023: Singapore Translational Cancer Consortium SPACER Award 
  • 2022: Duke-NUS Medical School - Khoo Pilot Award (Collaborative)
  • 2022: National Medical Research Council Clinician Scientist Individual Research Grant
  • 2022: NCCS Cancer Fund
  • 2021: National Medical Research Council Clinician Scientist Transition Award
  • 2021: SingHealth Duke-NUS Oncology Academic Clinical Programme Sarcoma Research Fund

RESEARCH
Our research is focused on functional precision medicine for the development of effective novel therapeutics matched to accurate predictive biomarkers for cancers in young people including sarcomas, lymphomas, skin and rare cancers. We hold multiple competitive national and international grants, as well as lead multiple clinical trials, including investigator-initiated trials that have spun out from our translational laboratory work. 

Our overarching aim is to improve systemic treatment outcomes for patients with sarcomas and rare cancers. Together with our clinical and research teams, we do this by: (a) accurately identifying clinical limitations in disease management through clinical practice and subspecialist center experience, which we use to frame clinical database analysis and global state-of-the-art reviews; (b) developing patient-derived models that faithfully recapitulate their original tumor characteristics; (c) developing accurate clinical, molecular and phenotypic biomarkers to match these patients to effective therapy; (d) functional precision medicine and functional genetic screens to derive effective drugs for treatment of rare cancers and (e) building a fully integrated, clinically annotated, multidimensional atlas of rare cancers in Asia for impactful clinical translation towards precision medicine and novel discoveries in rare cancer biology. We use a combination of clinical research, tumor samples, patient-derived models, ex vivo screens, in vivo genetic screens and multimodal data analysis, including Deep Learning and Artificial Intelligence to achieve our aims.

We believe that interfacing the modifiable gaps in Oncology and the questions that can be answered through evolving technology and innovation, as well as the mentoring of the next generation of young researchers and clinicians, can bring about real change in patient outcomes. The laboratory warmly welcomes students, clinicians and scientists to join our dynamic team. 


PUBLICATIONS   
  • Effectiveness of immune checkpoint inhibitors and other treatment modalities in patients with advanced mucosal melanomas: a systematic review and individual patient data meta-analysis.
    Teo AYT, Yau CE, Low CE, Pereira JV, Ng JYX, Soong TK, Lo JYT, Yang VS* (2022)
    EClinicalMedicine. 77:102870
    *Corresponding author

For a full list of publications, see: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/?term=Yang+VS

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