Dr. Janusz Rak M.D., Ph.D.

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Dr Janusz Rak graduated medicine and received his medical licence at the Medical Academy in Wroclaw, Poland. He received his PhD degree in tumor biology from the Ludwik Hirszfeld Institute of Immunology and Experimental Therapy, Polish Academy of Sciences in 1986 for studies on transplantable tumor models as predictors of treatment efficacy in cancer, changes in tumor-host interactions resulting from anti-cancer treatment, and interactions between tumor cells and the vasculature in the course of cancer metastasis.

In 1988, as a recipient of the Fullbright-Hays Postdoctoral Scholarship he joined the Michigan Cancer Foundation (MCF) in Detroit, Michigan, where he worked with Drs Fred and Bonnie Miller, and Gloria Heppner on tumor cell heterogeneity, tumor cell interactions in metastasis, alterations in cancer cell glycosylation and the role of ras oncogene in tumor progression. Some of these themes accompanied Dr Rak during his subsequent postdoctoral work with Dr Robert S. Kerbel at the University of Torono. Studies undertaken during this period of time included: 1. The role of ras oncogene in such aspects of cancer as: regulation of tumor cell-cell interactions, resistance to mechanical forces and growth under growth-restrictive and three-dimensional conditions (Rak & Kerbel 1993). 2. The role of ras oncogene in resistance of cancer cells to adhesion regulated programmed cell death (ARPCD) or 'anoikis' (Rak et al 1995), 3. "Multicellular drug resistance" in cancer (StCroix et al 1996, 1998). 4. The interrelationship between angiogenesis and tumor progression (Rak et al 1993, 1995, 1996, 1997, 1999, 2000, Villoria-Petit et al 1997, 2001, Yu et al 2001, 2002). The latter studies dealt specifically with the role of oncogenes as inducers of tumor angiogenesis (reviewed in Rak et al J. Exp. Der. 2000) and as regulators of 'angiogenesis dependence' of cancer cells (revied in Rak et al Cancer Res, 2002).

Dr Rak joined the Henderson Research Centre in 2000 as an Assistant Professor affiliated with the Department of Medicine and the Division of Oncology, McMaster University. His laboratory is currently pursuing studies on the relationship between angiogenesis and various activities of the hemostatic system both, in cancer and in other 'angiogenesis -dependent' diseases.

Dr Rak is an author or co-author of over 70 publications, recipient of peer-reviewed grants from the National Cancer Institute of Canada (NCIC) and Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC), and a reviewer for several research journals (Lancet, Journal of Cell Science, Cancer Research, International Journal of Cancer and others).