Loukia G. Karacosta, Ph.D.
Department of Cancer Systems Imaging, Division of Diagnostic Imaging
Present Title & Affiliation
Primary Appointment
Assistant Professor, Department of Cancer Systems Imaging, Division of Diagnostic Imaging, The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, TX
Dual/Joint/Adjunct Appointment
Graduate Faculty, Department of Quantitative Science Program, Division of Graduate School of Biomedical Science, The University of Texas Health Science Center, Houston, TX
Research Interests
Leveraging cancer systems biology approaches and single-cell technologies like mass cytometry (CyTOF) and multiplexed imaging, to interrogate phenotypic plasticity and the spatiotemporal dynamics that drive therapy resistance in the tumor microenvironment
Education & Training
Degree-Granting Education
| 2013 | School of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences University at Buffalo, SUNY, Buffalo, NY, USA, PHD, Pharmacology and Toxicology |
| 2006 | National & Kapodistrian University of Athens, Athens, GRC, BS, Biology |
Postgraduate Training
| 2015-2019 | Postdoctoral Fellow, Stanford University, Stanford, CA |
| 2013-2015 | Postdoctoral Fellow, For-Robin Therapeutics, Buffalo, NY |
Experience & Service
Other Appointments/Responsibilities
Basic Life Research Scientist, Stanford University, Stanford, CA, 2019 - 2020
Honors & Awards
| 2020 | UT Rising Star, The University of Texas System |
| 2019 | Best Collaborative Research Project Proposal for a Prospective 1 year funding by the Cancer Systems Biology Consortium/U54 Grant Center, Cancer Systems Biology Consortium/U54 Grant Center, 1st Annual West Coast Symposium |
Professional Memberships
Selected Publications
Peer-Reviewed Articles
- Karacosta LG, Pancirer D, Preiss JS, Benson JA, Trope W, Shrager JB, Sung AW, Neal JW, Bendall SC, Wakelee H, Plevritis SK. Phenotyping EMT and MET cellular states in lung cancer patient liquid biopsies at a personalized level using mass cytometry. Sci Rep 13(1):21781, 2023. e-Pub 2023. PMID: 38065965.
- Adler FR, Anderson ARA, Bhushan A, Bogdan P, Bravo-Cordero JJ, Brock A, Chen Y, Cukierman E, DelGiorno KE, Denis GV, Ferrall-Fairbanks MC, Gartner ZJ, Germain RN, Gordon DM, Hunter G, Jolly MK, Karacosta LG, Mythreye K, Katira P, Kulkarni RP, Kutys ML, Lander AD, Laughney AM, Levine H, Lou E, Lowenstein PR, Masters KS, Pe'er D, Peyton SR, Platt MO, Purvis JE, Quon G, Richer JK, Riddle NC, Rodriguez A, Snyder JC, Lee Szeto G, Tomlin CJ, Yanai I, Zervantonakis IK, Dueck H. Modeling collective cell behavior in cancer: Perspectives from an interdisciplinary conversation. Cell Syst 14(4):252-257, 2023. PMID: 37080161.
- Bhattacharyya S, Ehsan SF, Karacosta LG. Phenotypic maps for precision medicine: a promising systems biology tool for assessing therapy response and resistance at a personalized level. Front Netw Physiol 3:1256104, 2023. e-Pub 2023. PMID: 37964768.
- Ghazal D, Zalzala F, Fisk JC, Tati S, Karacosta LG, Morey S, Olson JR, Quataert S, Dy GK, Rittenhouse-Olson K. Therapeutic efficacy of the humanized JAA-F11 anti-Thomsen-Friedenreich antibody constructs H2aL2a and H3L3 in human breast and lung cancer xenograft models. Oncotarget 13:1155-1164, 2022. e-Pub 2022. PMID: 36264086.
- Bouchard G, Garcia-Marques F, Karacosta LG, Zhang W, Bermudez A, Riley N, Mehl L, Benson J, Shrager J, Bertozzi C, Pitteri S, Giaccia A, Plevritis S. Multi-Omics Analysis of Fibroblasts from the Invasive Tumor Edge Reveals that Tumor-Stroma Crosstalk Induces O-glycosylation of the CDK4-pRB Axis. Cancer Research 82(4):648-664, 2021. PMID: 34853070.
- Karacosta LG. From imaging a single cell to implementing precision medicine: an exciting new era. Emerg Top Life Sci 5(6):837-847, 2021. PMID: 3488944.
- Karacosta LG, Anchang B, Ignatiadis N, Kimmey SC, Benson JA, Shrager JB, Tibshirani R, Bendall SC, Plevritis SK. Mapping lung cancer epithelial-mesenchymal transition states and trajectories with single-cell resolution. Nat Commun 10(1):5587, 2019. e-Pub 2019. PMID: 31811131.
- Menden MP, Wang D, Mason MJ, Szalai B, Bulusu KC, Guan Y, Yu T, Kang J, Jeon M, Wolfinger R, Nguyen T, Zaslavskiy M, AstraZeneca-Sanger Drug Combination DREAM Consortium; Karacosta LG, Jang IS, Ghazoui Z, Ahsen ME, Vogel R, Chaibub Neto E, Norman T, Tang EKY, Garnett MJ, Di Veroli DY, Fawell S, Stolovitzky G, Guinney J, Dry JR, Saez-Rodriguez J. Community assessment to advance computational prediction of cancer drug combinations in a pharmacogenomic screen. Nat Commun 10(1):2674, 2019. PMID: 31209238.
- Tati S, Fisk JC, Abdullah J, Karacosta L, Chrisikos T, Philbin P, Morey S, Ghazal D, Zazala F, Jessee J, Quataert S, Koury S, Moreno D, Eng JY, Glinsky VV, Glinskii OV, Sesay M, Gebhard AW, Birthare K, Olson JR, Rittenhouse-Olson K. Corrigendum to "Humanization of JAA-F11, a Highly Specific Anti-Thomsen-Friedenreich Pancarcinoma Antibody and In Vitro Efficacy Analysis". Neoplasia 19(9):716-733, 2018. PMID: 29277397.
- Anchang B, Davis KL, Fienberg HG, Williamson BD, Bendall SC, Karacosta LG, Tibshirani R, Nolan GP, Plevritis SK. DRUG-NEM: Optimizing drug combinations using single-cell perturbation response to account for intratumoral heterogeneity. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A 115(18):E4294-E4303, 2018. e-Pub 2018. PMID: 29654148.
- Karacosta LG, Fisk JC, Jessee J, Tati S, Turner B, Ghazal D, Ludwig R, Johnson H, Adams J, Sajjad M, Koury S, Roy R, Olson JR, Rittenhouse-Olson K. Preclinical Analysis of JAA-F11, a Specific Anti-Thomsen-Friedenreich Antibody via Immunohistochemistry and In Vivo Imaging. Transl Oncol 11(2):450-466, 2018. e-Pub 2018. PMID: 29477636.
- Tati S, Fisk JC, Abdullah J, Karacosta LG, Chrisikos T, Philbin P, Morey S, Ghazal D, Zazala F, Jessee J, Quataert S, Koury S, Moreno D, Eng JY, Glinsky VV, Glinskii OV, Sesay M, Gebhard AW, Birthare K, Olson JR, Rittenhouse-Olson K. Humanization of JAA-F11, a Highly Specific Anti-Thomsen-Friedenreich Pancarcinoma Antibody and In Vitro Efficacy Analysis. Neoplasia 19(9):716-733, 2017. PMID: 28830009.
- Toumazis I, Kurt M, Toumazi A, Karacosta LG, Kwon C. Comparative Effectiveness of Up-to-Three Lines of Chemotherapy Treatment Plans for Metastatic Colorectal Cancer. MDM Policy & Practice 2(2), 2017. PMID: 30288431.
- Gocher AM, Azabdaftari G, Euscher LM, Dai S, Karacosta LG, Franke TF, Edelman AM. Akt activation by Ca2+/calmodulin-dependent protein kinase kinase 2 (CaMKK2) in ovarian cancer cells. J Biol Chem 292(34):14188-14204, 2017. e-Pub 2017. PMID: 28634229.
- Karacosta LG, Kuroski LA, Hofmann WA, Azabdaftari G, Mastri M, Gocher AM, Dai S, Hoste AJ, Edelman AM. Nucleoporin 62 and Ca(2+)/calmodulin dependent kinase kinase 2 regulate androgen receptor activity in castrate resistant prostate cancer cells. Prostate 76(3):294-306, 2016. e-Pub 2015. PMID: 26552607.
- Karacosta LG, Foster BA, Azabdaftari G, Feliciano DM, Edelman AM. A Regulatory Feedback Loop Between Ca2+/Calmodulin-Dependent Protein Kinase Kinase 2 (CaMKK2) and the Androgen Receptor in Prostate Cancer Progression. Journal of Biological Chemistry (JBC) 287(29):24832-24842, 2012. PMID: 22654108.
Abstracts
- Bhattacharyya S, Stewart CA, Victorian AM, Ehsan SF, Lujan EF, Duarte A, Heymach JV, Wang J, Byers LA, LGKaracosta LG. Mapping therapy resistant phenotypes in SCLC liquid biopsies with single-cell proteomics at a personalized level. Mol Cancer Ther (2023) 22(12 Supplement):LB B05, 2023.
- Karacosta LG, Pancier D, Preiss J, Shranger JB, Sung AW, Neal JW, Bendall SC, Wakelee H, Plevritis SK. Phenotyping Malignant Pleural Effusions with Mass Cytometry: Evidence of EMT and MET States in Late-Stage NSCLC. Journal of Thoracic Oncology 17(9 Supplement):S577-S578, 2022.
- Karacosta LG, Anchang B, Ignatiadis N, Kimmey SC, Benson JA, Shrager JA, Tibshirani R, Bendall SC, Plevritis SK. A Single-Cell Resolution Map of EMT and Drug Resistance States for Evaluating NSCLC Clinical Specimens. Journal of Thoracic Oncology 14(10):S226-S227, 2019.
- Anchang B, Davis K, Fienberg H, Bendall S, Karacosta LG, Nolan G, Plevritis SK. Individualized drug combination based on single-cell drug perturbations. Cancer Research 78(13 Supplement):2275, 2018.
- Karacosta LG, Anchang B, Kimmey S, van de Rijn M, Shrager JB, Bendall SC, Plevritis SK. Identifying dynamic EMT states and constructing a proteomic EMT landscape of lung cancer using single cell multidimensional analysis. Cancer Research 78(13 Supplement):4997, 2018.
- Karacosta LG, Johnson H, Abdullah J, Chrisikos T, Ludwig R, Turner B, Tati S, Ghazal D, Sajjad M, Koury S, Morey S, Adams J, Rittenhouse-Olson K. Immunohistochemistry and radioimaging with hJAA-11 antibody to the Thomsen-Friedenreich antigen: Potential theranostic application for breast cancer. Cancer Research 76(14 Supplement):576, 2016.
- Gocher AM, Azabdaftari G, Karacosta LG, Franke TF, Edelman AM. CaMKK2 activates oncogenic Akt in ovarian cancer cells and is a promising therapeutic target. The FASEB Journal 30(1 Supplement):714.8, 2016.
- Gocher AM, Franke TF, Azabdaftari G, Karacosta LG, Edelman AM. Regulation of Akt activity, cell proliferation and viability in ovarian cancer cells by Ca2+/Calmodulin-dependent protein kinase kinase 2. Molecular Cancer Therapeutics 14(7), 2015.
- Karacosta LG, Foster BA, Azabdaftari G, Feliciano DM, Edelman AM. CaMKK2 regulates cellular proliferation and androgen receptor activity during prostate cancer progression. Cancer Research 72(4):A10, 2012.
Grant & Contract Support
| Title: | Constructing a Lung Cancer Map of Drug Resistant States with Single-Cell Analysis |
| Funding Source: | Tobacco-Related Disease Research Program (TRDRP) |
| Role: | Principal Investigator |
| Title: | Optimizing Drug Treatment Scheduling In-Silico |
| Funding Source: | Young Investigator Pilot Program |
| Role: | Co-Principal Investigator |
| Title: | The University of Texas System Science & Technology Acquisition and Retention Rising (STARs) Award |
| Funding Source: | The University of Texas System |
| Role: | Principal Investigator |
| Title: | [18F]4FN PET Imaging of Innate Immunity Activation During Immunotherapy-Induced Adverse Events |
| Funding Source: | NIH/NCI |
| Role: | Co-Investigator |
| Title: | Phenotyping Cellular Components and Assessing Potential Therapeutic Targets in SCLC Liquid Biopsies with CyTOF |
| Funding Source: | The University of Texas SPORE in Lung Cancer |
| Role: | Principal Investigator |
| Title: | LC230506: Mapping and Predicting Therapy Resistance in SCLC Liquid Biopsies at a Personalized Level |
| Funding Source: | DOD/Congressionally Directed Medical Research Programs (DOD/CDMRP) |
| Role: | Principal Investigator |
| Title: | Identifying Different Metabolic Sub-types of Prostate Cancer for Early Therapeutic Assessment |
| Funding Source: | Department of Defense (DOD) |
| Role: | Co-Investigator |
| Title: | Targeted Hyperpolarized Molecular Beacons for Colorectal Cancer Detection |
| Funding Source: | NIH/NIBIB |
| Role: | Co-Investigator |
| Title: | Targeting tumoral Lactobacillus iners to improve outcomes in cervical cancers |
| Funding Source: | NIH/NCI |
| Role: | Co-Investigator |
| Title: | Investigating the relationship of RONS bursts and ICANS following CART-T cell therapy |
| Funding Source: | QIAC/QPR |
| Role: | Principal Investigator |
Patient Reviews
CV information above last modified September 03, 2024