Stanford University
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Raya Saab
Lindhard Family Professor of Pediatric Cancer Biology
BioI am a pediatric oncologist, and I primarily treat children who are diagnosed with soft tissue sarcomas including rhabdomyosarcoma, and children diagnosed with the eye tumor retinoblastoma, as well as children with other solid tumors.
I have two very different areas of primary research interest, both of which I pursue with passion. One focuses on global oncology, including clinical and research resource capacity building towards effective treatment and improving outcomes of children with cancer worldwide. I work with collaborators across the globe towards a common goal of improving access to diagnostic and clinical care, training of multidisciplinary teams, and building clinical resources and research capacity to develop context-informed approaches to improving cancer care and achieving better outcomes for children diagnosed with cancer irrespective of where they happen to live.
My parallel research interest, which is the focus of my laboratory, is understanding oncogenic signaling in pediatric soft tissue sarcomas, in an effort to clarify the driving biology and determinants of metastatic disease, to uncover novel targets for more effective treatment. We use preclinical in vitro and in vivo models, including murine and human cell lines, and mouse models of cancer. We have recently uncovered a paracrine role for rhabdomyosarcoma-secreted exosomes in impacting biology of stromal cells. Rhabdomyosarcoma-derived exosomes carry specific miRNA cargo that imparts an invasive and migratory phenotype on normal recipient fibroblasts, and proteomic analysis revealed specific and unique pathways relevant to the two different molecular rhabdomyosarcoma subtypes that are driven by distinct oncogenic pathways. We identified that the driver oncogene in fusion-positive rhabdomyosarcoma, PAX3-FOXO1, modulates exosome cargo to promote invasion, migration, and angiogenic properties, and identified specific microRNA and protein cargo acting as effectors of PAX3-FOXO1 exosome-mediated signaling, including modulation of oxidative stress response and cell survival signaling. Our ongoing work is focused on interrogating specific paracrine signaling pathways and molecular mechanisms of metastatic disease progression in rhabdomyosarcoma, for potential therapeutic targeting.
