Chris Sander

Chris Sander, PhD, is a Professor of Cell Biology at Harvard Medical School and Director of the cBio Center at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute. He holds affiliations with the Ludwig Center at Harvard and the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard. Trained as a theoretical physicist, he transitioned to computational biology, founding departments at EMBL, Memorial Sloan Kettering, and co-founding the European Bioinformatics Institute's research branch. His research integrates quantitative methods (bioinformatics, AI, statistics) to model molecular networks, develop cancer precision medicine tools (e.g., cBioPortal), and study protein structures/evolutionary biology.

Key projects include predicting pancreatic cancer risk via deep learning of EHR data, designing protein therapies through AI, and identifying drug combinations to combat cancer resistance. Major contributions include tools like the evolutionary couplings server for 3D protein structure prediction and Pathway Commons for pathway data integration.

Notable awards include recognition as one of the world's most highly cited researchers (2023, 2024) and the AACR Team Science Award (2020). His work bridges academia and biotech, exemplified by collaborations with Millennium Pharmaceuticals and the development of therapeutic strategies targeting cancer 'escape pathways.'