Anna Spreafico and Maria Babak Receive 2024 Yvonne Award in the Mentorship Category

Yvonne Award Winners 2024 by OncoDaily

We are excited to announce the esteemed winners of the Yvonne Award by OncoDaily, designed to recognize young innovators and leaders advancing cancer care.

Yvonne Award in the Mentorship category is presented to Anna Spreafico and Maria Babak. The OncoDaily team extends their heartfelt congratulations and sincere gratitude to Dr. Spreafico and Prof. Babak for their exceptional impact on oncology education.

The Yvonne Award in the Mentorship category, presented by OncoDaily, honors mentors who have shown exceptional dedication and guidance in the field of oncology. This award recognizes individuals who have profoundly influenced the careers and development of the next generation of oncology professionals.

Recipients are celebrated for their commitment to nurturing their mentees, promoting growth, and fostering leadership within the oncology community. Their efforts ensure that emerging professionals are well-prepared to advance the field and enhance patient care.

About Anna Spreafico

Anna Spreafico holds the position of Associate Professor at the University of Toronto and serves as a Staff Medical Oncologist and Clinician-Investigator in the Division of Medical Oncology and Hematology at the Princess Margaret Cancer Centre University Health Network.

Nationally, she contributes as a member of the Canadian Cancer Trial Group (CCTG) Head and Neck Disease Site Executive Committee. On an international level, Dr. Spreafico is involved in the US NCI Head and Neck Cancer Steering Committee’s rare tumor task force and co-chairs the NRG Oncology Recurrent/Metastatic H&N Cancer Working Group.

She is also the overall Principal Investigator of the CTEP Project Team Member Application (PTMA) phase I study and collaborates with the CTEP, Organ Dysfunction Group on the phase Ib NCI9591 study.

Dr. Spreafico’s research focuses on early drug development and phase I clinical trials, particularly in melanoma, skin, and head and neck cancers. She engages in collaborations with prominent institutions both nationally and internationally, such as the Canadian Cancer Trials Group and the US NCI Cancer Therapy Evaluation Program.

Serving as Principal Investigator, she leads numerous early-phase, first-in-human, and first-in-class trials, as well as investigator-initiated biomarker-driven studies. To date, Dr. Spreafico has published 140 peer-reviewed manuscripts and authored well over 200 abstracts.

Dr. Spreafico has been honored with several national and international awards, including the 2014 ASCO Conquer Cancer Foundation Young Investigator Award, and has received three ASCO Merit Awards (2013-2015).

About Maria Babak

Dr. Maria (Masha) Babak is the Head of The Babak Lab and an Assistant Professor at the City University of Hong Kong.

From 2015 to 2020, Dr. Babak was a postdoctoral research fellow at the National University of Singapore under the mentorship of Prof. Wee Han Ang, where she developed a strong passion for drug discovery and drug target identification. In November 2020, she joined the City University of Hong Kong as an assistant professor.

Her research interests are at the intersection of chemistry, biology, and medicine, with a focus on the discovery and preclinical development of anticancer drugs for resistant and aggressive cancers with limited treatment options, such as malignant pleural mesothelioma and brain metastases.

Since 2007, Prof. Babak published more than 50 peer-reviewed journal articles and 3 book chapters. Among the journal articles, the majority of them appear in well-respected scientific journals in bioinorganic and medicinal chemistry, as well as chemical biology. To date, her publications have received more than 2100 citations.

In 2022, Prof. Babak was given the Graeme Hanson-AsBIC Early Career Award which recognizes early career researchers in the Asia Pacific region who are creating scientific impact in the field of biological inorganic chemistry.

The Yvonne Award by OncoDaily, symbolizing the strength and longevity of the yew tree, honors exceptional achievements in oncology with its unique Y-shaped sculpture that embodies resilience. Designed to recognize young innovators and leaders advancing cancer care, the Yvonne Award celebrates excellence and innovation in the field.