Michael Frederick Press

Michael Frederick Press is a Professor of Pathology at the Keck School of Medicine of the University of Southern California (USC). He serves as the Director of the Breast Cancer Analysis Lab and co-leader of the Women’s Cancers Program at USC Norris Comprehensive Cancer Center. Dr. Press holds the Harold E. Lee Chair in Breast Cancer Research and coordinates the Breast Cancer International Research Group Central Laboratory.

• Education: MD/PhD from the University of Chicago, followed by residency and faculty positions there before joining USC in 1988.

His research focuses on molecular genetic alterations in breast and gynecologic cancers, including HER2 status, CCND1 amplification, TOP2A mutations, and polygenic risk scores in African ancestry populations. Recent work includes multi-ancestry GWAS, circulating tumor cell transcriptomics, and HER2-low breast cancer consensus guidelines. Key scientific contributions include optimizing HER2 testing protocols and identifying ancestry-specific breast cancer susceptibility loci.

Dr. Press has received the Harold E. Lee Chair in Breast Cancer Research since 1998. His publications span genomic risk prediction, HER2-targeted therapy, and biomarker discovery in clinical trials. He leads the USC Breast Cancer Analysis Lab, which supports international clinical research collaborations, including the TRIO-013/LOGiC trial and ALTERNATIVE study.