Dr. Kit Lam was born in Hong Kong, obtained his B.A. in Microbiology in 1975 at the University of Texas at Austin, where he received a Robert A Welch Undergraduate Research Fellowship in 1974-75. He obtained his Ph.D. in Oncology in 1980 from McArdle Laboratory for Cancer Research, University of Wisconsin, and his M.D. in 1984 from Stanford University School of Medicine. He completed his Internal Medicine residency training and Medical Oncology Fellowship training at the University of Arizona. He is board certified in both Internal Medicine and Medical Oncology. He was on the faculty of the University of Arizona until June 1999, when he joined UC Davis School of Medicine as the Division Chief of Hematology/Oncology, a position he continues to hold today. He is both a practicing medical oncologist and a laboratory investigator. Dr. Lam is recognized as one of the three pioneers (in addition to Mario Geysen and Richard Houghten) who started the field of synthetic combinatorial chemistry in the late 1980s and early 1990s.

 

His expertise is on the development and application of combinatorial chemistry and other chemical methods to solve biomedical problems. Dr. Kit Lam conceived the "one-bead-one-compound" (OBOC) concept to generate huge chemical libraries. With the help of his mentor, the late Dr. Sidney Salmon (Director of the Arizona Cancer Center) and other colleagues at the University of Arizona, he was able to reduce the OBOC combinatorial library method to practice, filed the patent, and published the technique in Nature in 1991. This represents one of the first few reports in the new field of combinatorial chemistry at the time. Since then, the field of combinatorial chemistry has rapidly evolved into a new chemistry discipline, and four scientific journals are now devoted to this field (J of Combinatorial Chemistry, Combinatorial Chemistry and Highthroughput Screening, Molecular Diversity, and QSAR Combinatorial Science). Combinatorial chemistry has become an indispensable tool in drug development and chemical research. The OBOC combinatorial library approach is unique and truly an ultra-high throughput method, as thousands to millions of chemical compounds (peptides, peptidomimetics, small molecules, and macrocyclic natural product like molecules) can be efficiently synthesized and screened in parallel in a relatively short time. Many investigators around the world have successfully applied the OBOC methods to their research, ranging from basic research to drug discovery to biosensor to catalysis to material science.  Since its publication in 1991, the Lam paper on OBOC method has been cited over 1,100 times. 

 

Members of Dr. Lam's group include:

 

To read more about Dr. Kit Lam's research projects, please click on http://oboc.ucdavis.edu/.

 

 

Dr. Zach Smith graduated from the Institute of Optics at the University of Rochester in April of this year.  His thesis was titled "Integrated Raman and Angular Scattering of Single Biological Cells" and he was supervised by Prof. Andrew Berger.  Zach joined CBST in November 2009 and is currently working with Drs. Sebastian Wachsmann-Hogiu  and Thomas Huser on time-gated Raman scattering and Raman cytometry.

 

Dr. Kaiqin Chu graduated from the Institute of Optics at the University of Rochester in 2009.  Her thesis was titled "Partition Lenses for Extended Depth of Field".  At CBST, Dr. Chu will work on two projects: (1) An X-ray related project where she will perform simulations and have access to the X-ray lasers at Stanford University and (2) a second project that will involve utilization of the OMX microscope.

In mid-October, sixteen interns from the CBST Summer 2009 undergraduate research program, including all nine of the ET CURE interns (a joint CBST/UCD Cancer Center program), attended the annual conference of the Society for the Advancement of Chicanos and Native Americans in Science (SACNAS) in Dallas. The majority of interns received travel awards to offset the costs of attending the conference. At the conference, the interns listened to presentations by leading scientists, attended career development workshops, explored funding opportunities and graduate programs at the exhibit booths, and enjoyed opportunities to socialize with the over 2700 participants (a conference record!). They also presented their own research in poster sessions. The mentors prepared the interns well; all received positive feedback on their work. Three interns received awards for their presentations: Leah Meza, Ngabo Nzigira, and Joyce Wong.  In addition, the interns helped staff the UC Davis/CBST recruitment booth; demonstrating light matter interactions with gummy bears and lasers, answering questions about the CBST summer internship program, and promoting summer programs for teachers. Marco Molinaro and Jodie Galosy, who accompanied the students, gave a workshop for teachers on biophotonics activities for the classroom. Molinaro also organized a cross STC (Science & Technology Center) presentation on the conference theme of interdisciplinary science.

The STC Educator's Conference, funded by a grant from the National Science Foundation, took place October 14-15 in Dallas, prior to the SACNAS conference.  The purpose of the conference was to explore collaborations that would strengthen the impact of STCs on K-20 STEM education.  Marco Molinaro and Jodie Galosy, from the CBST Education Team, co-chaired the conference and met with a planning committee to develop the conference agenda. Tania Miller, CBST Executive Assistant to the Director & Sr. Management, coordinated conference logistics and was available on site to provide support during the conference.

 

Twenty-five (25) people, representing twelve STCs, attended the conference. Conference activities included an introductory poster session where participants highlighted their center's educational programs, several presentations by invited speakers, and brainstorming/working sessions to identify and develop joint proposals of mutual interest. The working sessions resulted in initial drafts of three major proposals: a workshop to develop a joint STC REU evaluation, a survey of teacher professional development in STCs, and a plan for developing portable, affordable technologies for networking and data collection. The attendees gave the conference high marks, appreciated the opportunity to network with other STC educators, and recommended future working conferences on specific topics of interest to STC educators.

For the November 12th brown bag meeting, CBST hosted Dr. George Cimino, an R&D executive with 23 years of experience in drug/medical device and PCR diagnostic areas, who talked about the regulatory approvals for drugs and medical devices in the US. Along with covering the FDA's regulatory processes, Dr. Cimino covered the context of organizational and operational modus operandi for commercial entities and how they differ from those of academia, as well as career pathways in industry.

 

For more information and to be added to the e-mail list, please contact Dr. Amy L. Gryshuk, Amy.Gryshuk@cbst.ucdavis.edu. 

 

The three panelists also visited CBST and engaged in lively and open discussions with scientists, researchers, graduate students, and management of the Center about strategies for university-based medical technology commercialization.