Jenny C. Chang, M.D. ​

Stand Up To Cancer Keynote Speaker 

Dr. Jenny C. Chang is the Emily Herrmann Presidential Distinguished Chair in Cancer Research and Executive Director of the Dr. Mary and Ron Neal Cancer Center at Houston Methodist Hospital in Houston, Texas, and Professor at Weill Cornell Medical School. She obtained her medical degree at Cambridge University and completed fellowship training in medical oncology at the Royal Marsden Hospital/Institute for Cancer Research in the United Kingdom. She was awarded a research doctorate from the University of London. Her recent work has focused on the intrinsic therapy resistance of cancer stem cells (CSCs), and novel targets that alter the tumor microenvironment (TME). Her work is now focused on the mechanisms that regulate CSCs and TME, as well as initiating and planning clinical trials that target these pathways. She is also interested in characterizing the cross-talk between these different pathways that may lead to mechanisms of resistance, and has identified some of the chief regulatory pathways, including inducible nitric oxide (iNOS) and JAK/STAT3 signaling involved in CSC self-renewal. She is a world-renown clinical investigator, credited as one of the first to describe intrinsic chemoresistance of CSCs.