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Lucas A Salas, MD, MPH, PhD

Title(s)
Assistant Professor of Epidemiology

Additional Titles/Positions/Affiliations
Investigator Cancer Population Sciences Research Program, Dartmouth Cancer Center

Department(s)
Epidemiology

Education
Universitat Pompeu Fabra, PhD 2015
Universitat Pompeu Fabra, MPH 2011
Universidad de Antioquia, Epidemiology 2007
Universidad Nacional de Colombia, MD 2001

Programs
Quantitative Biomedical Sciences
Other

NIH Biosketch
Salas_L_BIO_2020-09-21.pdf

Websites
https://sites.dartmouth.edu/salaslab/
https://orcid.org/0000-0002-2279-4097
https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=FsRf5lQAAAAJ&hl=en
https://publons.com/researcher/1222796/lucas-a-salas/
https://bioconductor.org/packages/release/data/experiment/html/FlowSorted.Blood.EPIC.html
https://bioconductor.org/packages/release/data/experiment/html/FlowSorted.CordBloodCombined.450k.html

Contact Information


Professional Interests

The broad goal of Dr. Salas research is to investigate how cell heterogeneity impacts human health and disease, with an emphasis on how genetic, environmental, and lifestyle factors model the human epigenome and therefore the cell plasticity. Dr. Salas’ laboratory studies how some key epigenetic mechanisms (DNA methylation, DNA hydroxymethylation, and miRNA alterations) affect gene expression and cancer outcomes, including how the immune cells are altered in this disease. Other research interests include biomarker development, chronic inflammation, and human disease, and how exposures during fetal life alter newborn and childhood outcomes.

Grant Information

W81XWH-20-1-0778, Congressionally Directed Medical Research Programs/Department of Defense
Salas Diaz, Lucas A (PI) 09/01/20-08/31/24
Epigenetic modifications of cytosines in clear cell kidney carcinogenesis and survival
P20 GM104416-09/8299, National Institute of General Medical Sciences
Salas Diaz, Lucas A (PI) 10/01/20-01/01/23
A single-cell approach to disentangle tumor microenvironments in short and long survivors to clear cell renal carcinoma

Courses Taught

QBS.132
CANB.103
MDED.118
QBS.271
PEMM.212

Mentoring Information

Current trainees:
Chinaza Nnam, MCB
Minghui Zhang, QBS
Mary (Yiping) Li, QBS
Hannah Stolrrow, QBS
Erick Mmboya, QBS

Former trainees:
Ze Zhang, PhD, (QBS)
Steven Pike, PhD (IND)
Prasoona Karra, PhD (postdoctoral fellow)
Michael Mariani, PhD (postdoctoral fellow)


Selected Publications

 

Reply to: "Comments on the paper 'Extensive epigenomic dysregulation is a hallmark of homologous recombination deficiency in triple-negative breast cancer' by Y. Chen et al.".
Chen Y, Salas LA, Marotti JD, Jenkins NP, Cheng C, Miller TW, Kettenbach AN, Christensen BC
Int J Cancer. 2025 Aug 1;157(3):590-591. doi: 10.1002/ijc.35434. Epub 2025 Apr 18.
PMID: 40474572

Genomic Characterization of High-Grade Serous Ovarian Carcinoma Reveals Distinct Somatic Features in Black Individuals.
Lawson-Michod KA, Marks JR, Collin LJ, Nix DA, Davidson NR, Huff CD, Yu Y, Atkinson A, Johnson CE, Salas LA, Peres LC, Greene CS, Schildkraut JM, Doherty JA
Cancer Res. 2025 May 2;85(9):1725-1737. doi: 10.1158/0008-5472.CAN-24-1879.
PMID: 40063699

Homologous recombination deficiency in ovarian high-grade serous carcinoma by self-reported race.
Lawson-Michod KA, Johnson CE, Barnard ME, Davidson N, Collin LJ, Nix DA, Huff C, Berchuck A, Salas LA, Greene C, Marks JR, Peres LC, Doherty JA, Schildkraut JM
medRxiv. 2025 Jan 28; pii: 2025.01.21.25320918. doi: 10.1101/2025.01.21.25320918. Epub 2025 Jan 28.
PMID: 39974072

Extensive epigenomic dysregulation is a hallmark of homologous recombination deficiency in triple-negative breast cancer.
Chen Y, Salas LA, Marotti JD, Jenkins NP, Cheng C, Miller TW, Kettenbach AN, Christensen BC
Int J Cancer. 2025 Mar 15;156(6):1191-1202. doi: 10.1002/ijc.35274. Epub 2024 Dec 5.
PMID: 39635770

Insights to aging prediction with AI based epigenetic clocks.
Levy JJ, Diallo AB, Saldias Montivero MK, Gabbita S, Salas LA, Christensen BC
Epigenomics. 2025 Jan;17(1):49-57. doi: 10.1080/17501911.2024.2432854. Epub 2024 Nov 25.
PMID: 39584810

Methylation cytometric pretreatment blood immune profiles with tumor mutation burden as prognostic indicators for survival outcomes in head and neck cancer patients on anti-PD-1 therapy.
Zhang Z, Sehgal K, Shirai K, Butler RA, Wiencke JK, Koestler DC, Ramush G, Lee MK, Molinaro AM, Stolrow HG, Birnbaum A, Salas LA, Haddad RI, Kelsey KT, Christensen BC
NPJ Precis Oncol. 2024 Nov 18;8(1):267. doi: 10.1038/s41698-024-00759-8. Epub 2024 Nov 18.
PMID: 39558036

Glioma immune microenvironment composition calculator (GIMiCC): a method of estimating the proportions of eighteen cell types from DNA methylation microarray data.
Pike SC, Wiencke JK, Zhang Z, Molinaro AM, Hansen HM, Koestler DC, Christensen BC, Kelsey KT, Salas LA
Acta Neuropathol Commun. 2024 Oct 28;12(1):170. doi: 10.1186/s40478-024-01874-0. Epub 2024 Oct 28.
PMID: 39468647

An initial game-theoretic assessment of enhanced tissue preparation and imaging protocols for improved deep learning inference of spatial transcriptomics from tissue morphology.
Fatemi MY, Lu Y, Diallo AB, Srinivasan G, Azher ZL, Christensen BC, Salas LA, Tsongalis GJ, Palisoul SM, Perreard L, Kolling FW 4th, Vaickus LJ, Levy JJ
Brief Bioinform. 2024 Sep 23;25(6) doi: 10.1093/bib/bbae476.
PMID: 39367648

An assessment of compositional methods for the analysis of DNA methylation-based deconvolution estimates.
Alsup A, Nissen E, Salas LA, Molinaro AM, Reiner A, Liu S, Madsen TE, Liu L, Auer PL, Christensen BC, Wiencke JK, Kelsey KT, Koestler DC
Epigenomics. 2024;16(15-16):1067-1080. doi: 10.1080/17501911.2024.2379242. Epub 2024 Aug 2.
PMID: 39093129

Recalibrate concepts of epigenetic aging clocks in human health.
Zhang Z, Christensen BC, Salas LA
Aging (Albany NY). 2024 Jul 17;16(14):11125-11127. doi: 10.18632/aging.206027. Epub 2024 Jul 17.
PMID: 39028368

View more publications on PubMed