The Conquer Cancer Foundation of the American Society of Clinical Oncology is pleased to announce the 25 recipients of 2011 Breast Cancer Symposium Merit Awards, which recognize researchers' contributions to progress against breast cancer. The Foundation will present $25,000 to the recipients at the Breast Cancer Symposium, September 8-10 in San Francisco.

"It is because of scientific research, like that of this year's Merit Award winners, that death rates for patients with breast cancer have steadily declined over the past 20 years," said Shawna C. Willey, MD, FACS, Chair of the 2011 Breast Cancer Symposium Steering Committee. "The bright minds receiving the awards this year are making great contributions to the lives of patients living with breast cancer."

This year's Breast Cancer Symposium Merit Award winners and the research they will be presenting at the Symposium are:

• Laleh Amiri-Kordestani, MD, National Cancer Institute, National Institutes of Health
  Determining the rate of tumor growth and decay in patients with metastatic breast cancer as an early efficacy endpoint: A study assessing ixabepilone efficacy.

• Maria Ascierto, MD, National Institutes of Health
  Immunologic markers associated with favorable prognosis in breast cancer patients: Role of innate immune system.

• Mariana Chavez-MacGregor, MD, MSc, The University of Texas M. D. Anderson
  Cancer Center
  Relationship between differences in RNA or protein expression and the effects of race/ethnicity on breast cancer outcomes.

• Stephanie Childs, MD, Harvard Radiation Oncology Program
  Surgical margins and the risk of local-regional recurrence following mastectomy for early-stage breast cancer. 

• John Cox, MD, Department of Radiation Oncology, University of Texas
  Pleomorphic lobular breast carcinoma: A review of 35 cases at a single institution.

• Lana De Souza Lawrence, MD, The Sidney Kimmel Comprehensive Cancer Center at Johns Hopkins University
  Triple-negative breast cancer outcomes with partial breast irradiation and concurrent chemotherapy compared with whole breast irradiation and sequential chemotherapy.

• Makenzi Evangelist, MD, University of Tennessee Cancer Institute
  Quantitative nuclease protection assay (qNPA) for gene expression analysis on breast cancer core biopsies.

• Nooshin Hashemi Sadraei, MD, Cleveland Clinic
  Expression of FIP200 and rb in breast cancer metastasis to the brain.  

• Komal Jhaveri, MD, Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center
  Standardized uptake value by positron emission tomography/computed tomography (PET/CT) as a prognostic variable in metastatic breast cancer.
  Dr. Jhaveri is also the recipient of a 2011 Conquer Cancer Foundation of ASCO Young Investigator Award.

• Andrew Kim, MD, Los Angeles County and University of Southern California Medical Center
  Diffusion-weighted magnetic resonance imaging in patients with known or suspected breast malignancy: Correlation between apparent diffusion coefficient and histopathologic diagnoses.

• John Lyons, MD, Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center
  Axillary node staging for microinvasive breast cancer: Is it justified?

• Shannon MacLaughlan, MD, Alpert Medical School of Brown University Women and Infants Hospital
  Comparison of hypnotherapy versus gabapentin in the treatment of hot flashes: A pilot study.

• Mark Jesus Magbanua, PhD, University of California, San Francisco
  Genome-wide copy number analysis of circulating tumor cells from patients with metastatic breast cancer.

• Usama Mahmood, MD, University of Maryland
  Equivalent survival with breast-conservation therapy or mastectomy in the management of young women with early-stage breast cancer.

• Aju Mathew, MD, MPhil, University of Pittsburgh Medical Center
  Prognostic role of triple-negative subtype in breast cancer patients with brain metastases.

• Lee McGhan, MB, BCh, Mayo Clinic
  The impact of breast reconstruction on the decision to undergo contralateral prophylactic mastectomy.

• David H. A. Nguyen, MD, FRCPC, British Columbia Cancer Agency
  Can locoregional treatment of the primary tumor improve outcomes for women with stage IV breast cancer at diagnosis?

• Kanwal Raghav, MD, The University of Texas M. D. Anderson Cancer Center
  Nomogram for predicting development of brain metastasis in patients with inflammatory breast cancer.    

• Chirag Shah, MD, Oakland University William Beaumont School of Medicine, Beaumont Cancer Institute
  The impact of lymph node status on clinical outcomes following accelerated partial breast irradiation.

• Michelle Sowden, DO, Yale University
  Who provides ongoing care to breast cancer survivors and does it make a difference?    

• Shawn Steen, MD, John Wayne Cancer Institute at Saint John's Hospital
  Predicting nipple-areolar involvement using preoperative breast MRI and primary tumor characteristics.

• John Wilkinson, MD, Oakland University William Beaumont School of Medicine, Beaumont Cancer Institute
  Outcomes by breast cancer subtype in patients treated with accelerated partial breast irradiation.

• Dong Xiang, MD, James Graham Brown Cancer Center, University of Louisville
  A vaccine approach for breast-cancer immunotherapy by targeting HER-2/neu antigen to Î’ cells via CD19 molecule.

• Urszula Zurawska, MD, University of Toronto
  Management of early-stage breast cancer: Are we headed in the right direction?

Conquer Cancer Foundation Merit Awards are designed to promote clinical research of oncology fellows by providing them with the opportunity to present their research findings at the the ASCO Annual Meeting and ASCO co-sponsored thematic symposia. Recipients are selected based on the scientific merit of their submitted abstract and receive funding to assist with travel and expenses to attend the symposium.

The 2011 Breast Cancer Symposium Merit Awards are supported by Amgen; Bristol-Myers Squibb; Celgene Corporation; Lilly USA, LLC; Millennium: The Takeda Oncology Company; Novartis Oncology; Onyx Pharmaceuticals, Inc.; OSI Pharmaceuticals, Inc.; and sanofi-aventis U.S.