Women Leading the Way

Fredika M. Robertson, Ph.D., is Professor of Experimental Therapeutics with a joint appointment in Breast Medical Oncology at M. D. Anderson Cancer Center. She joined the faculty in March 2007. She was trained in experimental therapeutics and earned her Ph.D. degree from The State University of Buffalo Roswell Park Cancer Institute Grace Cancer Drug Center. Her dissertation work focused on the effects of polyamine biosynthesis inhibitors, which demonstrated for the first time that these inhibitors selectively induce autophagy, which interestingly, has recently emerged as an area of renewed research.

She was a postdoctoral fellow with Dr. Charles Heidelberger at the University of Southern California Norris Comprehensive Cancer Center in Los Angeles, CA and received training in models of multi-stage carcinogenesis. Her first academic appointment, as Assistant Professor, was at Rutgers University, University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey-Robert Wood Johnson Medical School-Rutgers University in New Brunswick New Jersey where she quickly (within 5 years) was promoted to Associate Professor with tenure. She accepted an appointment at The Ohio State University in the Department of Molecular Virology, Immunology and Molecular Genetics as Associate Professor with tenure in 1991, where she was promoted to Professor with tenure and served as Director of the Carcinogenesis Program at the OSU Comprehensive Cancer Center and as Director of the Analytical Cytometry Core Laboratory.

Dr. Robertson's research focus is in two areas, breast cancer and multi-stage skin carcinogenesis. Her breast cancer research focuses on defining the molecular basis for breast cancer invasion, angiogenesis, and metastasis and on identification of therapeutic targets to successfully intervene to prevent disease progression. Dr. Robertson's laboratory was the first to establish that the immediate early gene, cyclooxygenase-2 (Cox-2), which produces prostaglandin E2 (PGE2) is expressed at very early times during the development of breast cancers. These observations are the basis for the current evaluation of Cox-2 as a prognostic marker for disease progression in early lesions such as ductal carcinoma in situ. Cox-2 is a critically important gene involved in tumor re-initiation at sites distant from the primary tumor. Immediately following her observation that Cox-2 is present at very early times during breast cancer development, her laboratory demonstrated that Cox-2 directly regulates the production of estrogens/estradiol through stimulating the activity of the P450 CYP191A1 aromatase enzyme, which is responsible for biotransformation of androgens to produce estradiol. These studies demonstrated that this Cox-2 dependent regulation of aromatase occurs through promoter switching between specific aromatase promoter regions. Her laboratory developed the relevant models which are being used to evaluate the critical role of Cox-2 and the associated prostanoid receptors in breast cancer invasion, angiogenesis, vasculogenesis, and metastasis.

Dr. Robertson's photo taken by Cancer Medicine

Immediately following her arrival at M. D. Anderson, Dr. Robertson joined the Inflammatory Breast Cancer Research Program, for which she serves as Director of Translational Research. Her laboratory participates in the IBC program, which includes a group of 7 other principal investigators working together as a multi-disciplinary team to accelerate the identification of the molecular mechanisms of this rare but lethal type of breast cancer for which there are no effective therapeutics and no biomarkers. This interaction has provided the opportunity to participate in translational research. The program has an established seminar program, which hosts invited speakers who are experts in the field. It has also established a World IBC Alliance, which supports a global consortium and brings together investigators working in the field from around the world. She also interacts with chemists and those with expertise in computer modeling to support the synthesis of novel compounds that may be useful for treatment of the most aggressive forms of breast cancer.

Dr. Robertson actively collaborates with investigators at M. D. Anderson, as well as at other institutions, who are working in micro/nanotechnology that will allow the discovery of novel proteins as potential biomarkers, will expand the therapeutic platforms through the development of such agents as therapeutic aptamers, and will accelerate the development of devices for isolation and molecular characterization of specific cell populations such as cancer stem cells.

In addition to breast cancer, Dr. Robertson's research also focuses on defining the role of inflammation in the different steps of multi-stage skin carcinogenesis and in wound healing. Her laboratory was among the first to define a role of inflammatory cytokines in skin carcinogenesis and was the first to report a role for nitric oxide, peroxynitrate and associated alterations in DNA damage and oxidative DNA adduct formation during early stages of skin carcinogenesis. Recent work from her laboratory reported the critical role for PI3K/Akt in survival of skin stem cells located within the "bulge region" of hair follicles. In addition, using this model of multi-step skin carcinogenesis, her laboratory was the first to identify novel splice variants of vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) as having an important role in driving early changes associated with tumor-associated angiogenesis including increased permeability. These novel proteins within the VEGF family also have a role in wound healing and survival following exposure to cytotoxic agents. She is currently evaluating the role of developmentally-regulated genes including sonic hedgehog in skin carcinogenesis and wound healing.

Dr. Robertson has actively participated in a wide variety of educational and teaching activities. During her tenure at The Ohio State University, she was PI of an NIH/NCI T32 training grant for 10 years in the area of carcinogenesis, which provided support for 4 pre-doctoral students and 2 postdoctoral fellows each year. She has primarily trained young women who have gone on to successful careers in a broad range of areas including academics, pharmaceutical industry, biotechnology and biomedical informatics. She has directly supervised 15 Ph.D. or M.D./Ph.D. students and currently has 2 Ph.D. students and 1 postdoctoral fellow in her laboratory. In addition, she has trained 40 students, fellows and residents at all levels including undergraduate honors students and masters degree students, postgraduates including postdoctoral fellows, clinical fellows, Fulbright scholars, visiting scientists, non-tenure research track faculty, surgical residents, and has served as mentor/advisor for 35 graduate students during their laboratory rotations. Dr. Robertson currently serves as a member of the GSBS admissions committee and is a member of both the GSBS Cancer Biology Program and the newly developed Experimental Therapeutics Program. Dr. Robertson has extensive experience in teaching using didactic lecturing approaches as well as leading small group discussions. While at The Ohio State University, she developed and taught a course in Carcinogenesis/Oncology and another course in Pathogenesis of Inflammation-associated Disease, for which she provided all of the lecture content. In addition, she routinely provided lectures in the areas of Immunology and Pharmacology for medical, dental and graduate students.

Dr. Robertson in front of the Einstein statue, National Academy of Sciences building in Washington DC

During her career, Dr. Robertson has authored more than 85 publications, 10 invited articles, 4 book chapters, and has written articles in the Encyclopedia of Cancer, which is a web-based Wikipedia-like compendium of cancer-related information. She currently serves as associate editor for 2 cancer related journals and reviews manuscripts for multiple journals on an ad hoc basis.

Dr. Robertson has been an active participant as a reviewer for NIH/NCI and has served as both a regular member of NIH study sections as well as served as chair of Chemical Pathology study section for 4 years. She also served as a regular member of NIH/NCI subcommittee C, a P01 oversight committee. In addition, she also served as a member of study sections that reviews postdoctoral fellowships as well as serves as an ad hoc reviewer for multiple panels for the NCI Innovative Molecular Analysis Methodolgies (IMAT) program. Dr. Robertson has reviewed grants for both the Department of Defense (DOD) breast cancer research program and the Susan G. Komen Foundation. She currently serves as chair of Targeted Therapeutics study section for the Susan G. Komen Foundation and as a member of the Komen Promise Grant review panel.

Over the past 23 years, Dr. Robertson has routinely been the recipient of multiple peer reviewed funded grants from a variety of sources including NIH/NCI, the DOD Breast Cancer Research Program, The Susan G. Komen for the Cure Foundation as well as from private foundations. She is the co-principal investigator of a $7.5 million five-year Promise Grant from the Susan G. Komen Foundation. The goal of the research supported by this award is to define the molecular signatures of inflammatory breast cancer to allow identification of effective therapeutics. The ultimate goals of this research program is to determine the effectiveness of the agents identified from these studies in a clinical trial to effectively enhance the overall survival rate of IBC, which is currently 2.9 years. In addition, these studies will develop a panel of validated biomarkers to allow earlier and accurate detection of IBC, and provide a means to determine the response of the individual IBC patient to her therapy.