Michelle Haber

Michelle Haber
Born (1956-10-18) 18 October 1956
Liverpool, England
Nationality Australia
Fields Paediatric cancer
Institutions Children’s Cancer Institute Australia and The University of New South Wales, School of Women’s and Children’s Health
Alma mater University of New South Wales
Known for Identifying molecular targets in neuroblastoma and developing novel therapeutic approaches against them
Notable awards CINSW Premier's Award for Outstanding Cancer Researcher of the Year (2014)
Premier’s Award for Excellence in Translational Cancer Research (2012)
NSW Science and Engineering Award for Biomedical Sciences (2011)
Doctor of Science honoris causa, UNSW (2008)

Michelle Haber, AM, FAHMS (born 18 October 1956) is an Australian cancer researcher.

Haber is an Australian scientist in the field of childhood cancer research. She serves as the Executive Director of Children’s Cancer Institute[1] and is a Professor at the School of Women’s and Children’s Health, University of New South Wales.[2] She is known for her discoveries in the area of chemotherapy resistance in neuroblastoma and for translating these discoveries into new therapeutics that are currently in clinical trials.[3]

Education

Haber attended Mount Scopus Memorial College in Melbourne and, when her family moved to Sydney, attended Moriah College, graduating in 1973. She completed a clinical psychology degree at University of New South Wales and was awarded a University Medal. She obtained her PhD from the School of Pathology at the University of New South Wales in 1984 - her thesis was entitled ‘Structural analysis by BD-cellulose chromatography of mammalian DNA during repair, replication and degradation.[4] She was awarded a Doctor of Science honoris causa by the University of New South Wales in 2008.

Career

In 1982, during her PhD studies, Haber spent three months as Visiting Research Fellow at the Department of Molecular Virology in Hadassah Medical Centre, Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Her first postdoctoral position was at Children’s Leukaemia and Cancer Research Unit, a precursor to the Children’s Cancer Institute Australia located at the Prince of Wales Children’s Hospital, Randwick, where she has remained ever since, being promoted to Senior Research Fellow in 1992, Principal Research Fellow in 1996 and Director in 2000. Haber holds a conjoint appointment as Professor in the Faculty of Medicine at the University of New South Wales.

Under her leadership the Children’s Cancer Institute Australia, now located in the UNSW Lowy Cancer Research Centre,[5] has tripled in size and grown from a little known group to become the largest children’s cancer research facility in the region.[6]

Research

Haber’s early studies were amongst the first characterizing the complex molecular mechanisms underlying therapy-related drug resistance.[7][8] With her collaborators, she identified the relationship between high expression of multidrug transporter gene MRP1, and the malignant phenotype of neuroblastoma and poor clinical outcome.[9][10] These studies provided the first definitive demonstration of clinical relevance of the MRP1 gene in solid tumours, resulting in a large international clinical study which confirmed the independent prognostic significance of MRP1 expression in neuroblastoma and established MRP1 inhibition as a potential new treatment for this disease.[11]

By high-throughput chemical screening of small molecule libraries, Haber and her colleagues have also developed novel MRP1 inhibitors and patented and licensed the compounds for the treatment of neuroblastoma and other MRP1-associated malignancies. This led to a $3.1M award from the Australian Cancer Research Foundation to establish a Drug Discovery Centre for Childhood Cancer in the UNSW Lowy Cancer Research Centre, which is currently developing a pipeline of potential new drugs for treating childhood and adult malignancies.

Haber and her collaborators have also identified the role of ATP-binding cassette transporter genes (ABC transporters) in neuroblastoma biology, demonstrating that their expression predicts for poor clinical outcome in neuroblastoma[12] but, unexpectedly, this phenomenon was not due to the ABC proteins’ role in drug transport, but through an independent pathway that influences fundamental aspects of tumour biology. A further study on ovarian cancer and ABCA1[13] has extended the discovery to common adult cancers.

Service to the scientific community

Haber is a long-term member of the International Neuroblastoma Risk Group Committee, which makes recommendations regarding standardised protocols and best practice for identifying/utilising prognostic indicators for neuroblastoma treatment risk assessment.[14] From 2006 to 2014, Haber has served on the steering committee of the Advances in Neuroblastoma Research Association (ANRA), the peak international body for neuroblastoma research[15] and was President of this organisation from 2010 to 2012. In 2011, Haber also played a key role in establishment of the Kids Cancer Alliance and currently serves on this organization's executive management committee.[16] Haber is convenor of the 2016 Advances in Neuroblastoma Research conference (Cairns, Australia), one of the largest specialist childhood cancer conferences internationally.[17]

Awards and honours

In 2007 Haber was appointed a Member of the Order of Australia (AM) for service to science in the field of childhood cancer, to scientific education, and to the community[18] and she was also named as one of Australia’s 25 ‘True Leaders’ by Financial Review’s Boss Magazine. In 2008, Haber was awarded DSc (Honoris Causa) by University of New South Wales for eminent service to the cancer research community. She has received numerous awards for research excellence, including the NSW Science & Engineering Award for Biomedical Sciences (2011),[19] and in that same year was one of four NSW finalists for Australian of the Year.[20] In 2012, Haber (with her long-time collaborators Norris and Marshall) received the Cancer Institute NSW Premier’s Award for Excellence in Translational Cancer Research[21] and was also highlighted with an NHMRC Ten of the Best Award.[22] In 2013, she was showcased, again with Norris and Marshall, in an article in the Lancet.[23] In 2013 she was a finalist in the 2013 Australian Museum Eureka Prize for Medical Research Translation,[24] and in 2014 received the NSW Premier's Award for Outstanding Cancer Researcher of the Year.[25] Haber was elected a Fellow of the newly formed Academy of Australian Health and Medical Sciences in March 2015.[26]

References

  1. ↑ https://www.ccia.org.au
  2. ↑ http://med.unsw.edu.au/people/professor-michelle-haber
  3. ↑ https://www.nhmrc.gov.au/research-highlights/profile/professor-glenn-marshall
  4. ↑ http://phdtree.org/pdf/24459036-structural-analysis-by-bd-cellulose-chromatography-of-mammalian-dna-during-repair-replication-and-degradation/
  5. ↑ http://lowycancerresearchcentre.unsw.edu.au/about-us/welcome
  6. ↑ https://www.ccia.org.au/about-us/our-story/
  7. ↑ Haber M, Reed C, Kavallaris M, Norris MD, Stewart BW (1989). Resistance to drugs associated with the multidrug-resistance phenotype following selection for high-level methotrexate resistance. J Natl Cancer Inst 81: 1250-1254
  8. ↑ Haber M, Norris MD, Kavallaris M, Bell DR, Davey RA, White L, Stewart BW (1989). Atypical multidrug resistance in a therapy-induced drug resistant human leukemia line (LALW-2): Resistance to Vinca alkaloids independent of P-glycoprotein. Cancer Res 49: 5281-5287
  9. ↑ Bordow SB, Haber M, Madafiglio J, Cheung B, Marshall GM, Norris MD (1994). Expression of the multidrug resistance-associated protein (MRP) gene correlates with amplification and over-expression of the N-myc oncogene in childhood neuroblastoma. Cancer Res 54: 5036-5040
  10. ↑ Norris MD, Bordow SB, Marshall GM, Haber PS, Cohn SL, Haber M (1996). Expression of the gene for multidrug-resistance-associated protein and outcome in patients with neuroblastoma. New Engl J Med 334: 231-238
  11. ↑ Haber M, Smith J, Bordow SB, Flemming C, Cohn SL, London WB, Marshall GM, Norris MD (2006). Association of high-level MRP1 expression with poor clinical outcome in a large prospective study of primary neuroblastoma. J Clin Oncol 24 (10): 1546-1553
  12. ↑ Henderson MJ, Haber M, Porro A et al (2011). ABCC multi drug transporters in childhood neuroblastoma: clinical and biological effects independent of cytotoxic drug efflux. J Natl Cancer Inst 103 (16): 1236-1251.
  13. ↑ Hedditch EL et al (2014). ABCA transporter gene expression is associated with poor outcome in epithelial ovarian cancer. J Natl Cancer Inst 106 (7): DOI:10.1093/jnci/dju149.
  14. ↑ http://inrgdb.org/about/leadership/
  15. ↑ http://www.anrmeeting.org/index.php
  16. ↑ http://kidscanceralliance.org.au
  17. ↑ http://anr2016.org
  18. ↑ https://www.itsanhonour.gov.au/honours/honour_roll/search.cfm?aus_award_id=1133762&search_type=quick&showInd=true
  19. ↑ http://newsroom.unsw.edu.au/news/science-technology/scientist-year
  20. ↑ http://www.australianoftheyear.org.au/honour-roll/?view=results&year=2012&categoryID=0&desc=Australian+of+the+Year+2012
  21. ↑ http://www.cancerinstitute.org.au/research-grants-and-funding/research-achievements/annual-research-awards#2012
  22. ↑ https://www.nhmrc.gov.au/research-highlights/ten-of-the-best/2012
  23. ↑ http://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(13)61107-1/fulltext
  24. ↑ http://australianmuseum.net.au/2013-finalists-eureka
  25. ↑ http://www.cancerinstitute.org.au/news-events/latest-news/2014-nsw-outstanding-cancer-researcher-of-the-year-announced
  26. ↑ http://www.aahms.org/fellowship/
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