Posted: April 16, 2020
Professor Jean-Charles Soria has been appointed general director of Gustave Roussy for a term of 5 years. A medical oncologist and professor of medicine at Paris-Saclay University, Prof. Soria was the director of the Gustave-Roussy SIRIC Socrate (Integrated Cancer Research Site) between 2012 and 2017. Since September 2017, Prof. Soria was responsible for novel research and product development in immuno-oncology, cell therapy, and conjugated antibodies for AstraZeneca as vice president, Research & Development in Oncology. Prof. Soria also studied health management at the Harvard Business School in 2017-2018.
One of Prof. Soria’s first actions in his new role was to appoint Professor Fabrice Barlesi as medical director of the institute. An associate editor for the IASLC Lung Cancer News, Prof. Barlesi is professor of medicine at the University of Aix-Marseille and was the head of the Multidisciplinary Oncology and Innovative Therapies department and the Marseille Centre for Early Trials in Oncology at the Assistance Publique Hôpitaux de Marseille. In addition, he is the co-founder of the Marseille Immunopole, a French Immunology network, and he previously served as the vice-chair of the Provence, Alps and Côte d’Azur (PACA) Region Cancer Research Directorate. Prof. Barlesi coordinated the French Thoracic Intergroup (IFCT) Biomarkers France study, which, with more than 18,000 patients, is still one of the largest molecular profiling study on patients with lung cancer. He is also coordinating the PIONeeR project, a €25 million-project dedicated to the understanding and bypass of resistances to PD-(L)1 inhibitors in patients with lung cancer.
Profs. Soria and Barlesi worked together at the French Thoracic Intergroup (IFCT), where they developed and conducted several trials together, with the last one—the precision medicine SAFIR02 lung trial—to be presented this year. ✦
