Q: There are various new, emerging technologies that bring us closer towards a cure for life-threatening disorders such as cancer, HIV, or Huntington’s disease. Prominent examples include the popular gene editing tool CRISPR or new and improved cell and gene therapies. By when can we expect these new technologies being part of routine clinical care?

A: Genome sequencing for cancer and undiagnosed diseases is beginning to become part of clinical care.

Q: You participated in the OncoArray Consortium that studied genetic variants that contribute to the risk of developing breast cancer. What were the key findings? What impact would it have on breast cancer therapies?

A: The OncoArray consortium was actually studying a pre-designed array of 500K SNPs across 5 tumor sites (breast, colon, lung, ovary, prostate).

Q: Once sequencing has been validated as a clinical solution via trusted workflows, and coinciding with the technological developments driving costs lower, we can expect accelerated human genome profiling for clinical Dx. How soon, do you think, will we see accelerated growth and what can we expect?

A: I do not believe that DNA profiling is limited by the cost of the sequencing anymore, it is really a question of data management and interpretation.

Q: Patient healthcare data aggregation and analysis is seen as both the panacea for tremendous breakthroughs in precision medicine and as one of its biggest challenges. Are both true and how so?

A: Certainly, aggregating and analyzing healthcare data is a big challenge, but when we succeed, there are big breakthroughs. M2Gen is currently addressing those challenges head-on, but not alone.

Q: NGS is enhancing patient care through improved diagnostic sensitivity and more precise therapeutic targeting. Prominent examples include cystic fibrosis and cancer. What other clinical areas NGS will most likely to change the standard-of-care in the near future?

A: Rapid turnaround newborn sequencing is going to be the next place NGS revolutionizes.

Q: Artificial intelligence (AI) techniques have sent vast waves across healthcare, even fueling an active discussion of whether AI doctors will eventually replace human physicians in the future. Do you believe that human physicians will be replaced by machines in the foreseeable future?

A: I personally believe that this question is little unfair, why we need to think that will machines replace physicians?

Q: Earlier this year you joined Genomics England as the inaugural CEO. What were the reasons behind your decision to take up this position?

A: Genomics England is at the vanguard of the introduction of genomic information into healthcare. For a long time I have believed that genomics will revolutionize both medical research and medicine

Q: The Nobel Prize in Medicine was awarded recently to James Allison and Tasuku for their work on unleashing the body’s immune system to attack cancer, a breakthrough that has led to an entirely new class of drugs and brought lasting remissions to many patients who had run out of options. The Nobel committee hailed their accomplishments as establishing “an entirely new principle for cancer therapy.” What is your first-hand experience the impact that those new drugs had on patients?

A: Although I don’t have first-hand experience with those new drugs, several of my friends asked me for suggestions because they know I have been studying cancer immunotherapy for 15 years.

Q: What need is Tymora Analytical Operations addressing?

A: Virtually all of the current liquid biopsy assays are based on genomic information. But the active molecules in the body that are doing the work and undergoing changes during disease progression are actually proteins.

Q: The Nobel Price in Medicine was awarded recently to James Allison and Tasuku for their work on unleashing the body’s immune system to attack cancer, a breakthrough that has led to an entirely new class of drugs and brought lasting remissions to many patients who had run out of options. The Nobel committee hailed their accomplishments as establishing “an entirely new principle for cancer therapy.” What is your first-hand experience the impact that those new drugs had on patients?

A: Immunotherapy has completely changed the lives of many patients with melanoma, lung cancer and other type of cancers with tumors that have historically been difficult to treat.