Bissan Al-Lazikani, PhD, FRSB, FISCB, MBCS
Department of Genomic Medicine, Division of Cancer Medicine
About Dr. Bissan Al-Lazikani
About Dr. Al-Lazikani ::
Dr. Al-Lazikani is a data scientist and drug discoverer. She applies data science and machine learning to address key challenges in cancer drug discovery and development. Dr. Al-Lazikani has drug discovery experience in both academia and the biotechnology industry. Through this experience, she encountered the myriad of hurdles faced through drug discovery and development pipelines. Dr Al-Lazikani’s research focuses on bringing the power of Data and Artificial Intelligence to address these hurdles, accelerating drug discovery and de-risking innovation. Specifically, she applies data science approaches to integrate multi-disciplinary and multi-modal data to inform all aspects of cancer translational research; and to develop novel machine learning algorithms that learn from these integrated data. Together, her approaches inform decision-making and experimental design throughout the drug discovery and development pipeline. She led the development of the world’s largest public cancer drug discovery platform (canSAR.ai) to inform target selection and prioritization for drug discovery. She now leads the Therapeutics Data Science Initiative at MD Anderson Cancer Center to maximally exploit data to discovery novel drugs and individualize drugs and drug combinations for patients. ::
Present Title & Affiliation
Primary Appointment
Co-Lead, Department of Institute for Data Science in Oncology, Division of Cancer Medicine, The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, Texas
Director of Therapeutics Data Science, Department of Genomic Medicine, The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, TX
Professor, Department of Genomic Medicine, The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, TX
Education & Training
Degree-Granting Education
1999 | MRC Laboratory of Molecular Biology and Newnham College, Cambridge University, Cambridge, GB, Ph.D. in Structural Computational Biology |
1995 | Imperial College, London, GB, M.Sc. in Computer Science |
1994 | University College, London, GB, B.Sc. in Molecular Biology |
Experience & Service
Academic Appointments
Professor, The Institute of Cancer Research, London, 2018 - 2021
Associate Professor, The Institute of Cancer Research, London, 2015 - 2018
Assistant Professor, The Institute of Cancer Research, London, 2009 - 2015
Administrative Appointments/Responsibilities
Chair of Cancer and Drug Discovery Data Science, The Institute of Cancer Research, 2018 - 2021
Head of Data Science, The Institute of Cancer Research, 2016 - 2021
Honors & Awards
Medical Research Council PhD Scholarship | |
Howard Hughes Postdoctoral Fellowship | |
Institute of Cancer Research Career Development Faculty Establishment Funds | |
AACR Team Science Award, American Association for Cancer Research |
Professional Memberships
Selected Publications
Peer-Reviewed Articles
- Overington JP, Al-Lazikani B, Hopkins AL. How many drug targets are there?. Nat Rev Drug Discov 5(12):993-6, 2006. PMID: 17139284.
Grant & Contract Support
Title: | Accelerating Drug Discovery and Development |
Funding Source: | The Commonwealth Foundation for Cancer Research and MD Anderson Cancer Center |
Role: | PI |
Title: | Established Investigators Recruitment Dr. Bissan Al-Lazkani |
Funding Source: | Cancer Prevention & Research Institute of Texas (CPRIT) |
Role: | PI |
Title: | The Chemical Probes Portal: An Open Resource Empowering High Quality Chemical Biology |
Funding Source: | Wellcome Trust Biomedical Resources Grant |
Role: | Co-PI |
Title: | Prostate Cancer Patient Profiling for Drug Repositioning and Discovery |
Funding Source: | Philanthropic award to Rosalind Eels and Bissan Al-Lazikani |
Role: | Co-PI |
Title: | Cancer Research UK Stratified Medicine Paediatrics – SMPaeds |
Funding Source: | Cancer Research United Kingdom |
Role: | Co-PI |
Title: | Biomedical Research Centre Award to the Royal Marsden and ICR |
Funding Source: | National Institute of Health Research |
Role: | Co-PI |
Title: | National Institute for Health Research The Knowledge Hub (C84) |
Funding Source: | Biomedical Research Centre |
Role: | PI |
Title: | Drug Discovery core grant to the ICR’s CRUK Cancer Therapeutic Unit |
Funding Source: | Cancer Research United Kingdom |
Role: | Co-PI |
Title: | CRUK Centre Award to the ICR and Royal Marsden |
Funding Source: | Cancer Research United Kingdom |
Role: | Co-PI |
Title: | BBSRC ‘FunPDBe’ functional annotation of protein structures |
Funding Source: | Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council |
Role: | Co-PI |
Title: | PhD studentship: Integrative genomics to improve castration resistant prostate cancer treatment |
Funding Source: | Prostate Cancer UK |
Role: | Co-PI |
Title: | Drug Discovery Committee Strategic Award |
Funding Source: | Cancer Research United Kingdom |
Role: | PI |
Title: | CRUK Drug Discovery core grant to the ICR’s CRUK Cancer Therapeutic Unit |
Funding Source: | Cancer Research United Kingdom |
Role: | Co-PI |
Title: | Wellcome Trust Chemogenomic Strategic Award |
Funding Source: | Wellcome Trust |
Role: | Co-PI |
Patient Reviews
CV information above last modified January 21, 2025