Brent Hanks, MD, PhD, a physician-scientist who specializes in treating advanced cutaneous and upper gastrointestinal malignancies, as well as managing immunotherapy-associated toxicities, has joined the UNC Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center, the UNC School of Medicine and UNC Health as an associate professor of medicine.
Hanks previously was on faculty at Duke University School of Medicine, where he held key leadership roles, including associate director of basic and translational research at the Duke Center for Cancer Immunotherapy and associate director of translational sciences in the melanoma program.
In addition to providing patient care, Hanks leads a research lab focused on tumor-mediated immune evasion and immunotherapy resistance. His work explores tumor-intrinsic mechanisms of immune evasion, tumor-driven manipulation of dendritic cell functionality, and the role of tumor-mediated innate training in immunotherapy resistance and immunotherapy-associated toxicities.
His research has been robustly supported with federal, foundation and industry grants, including from the National Institutes of Health, National Cancer Institute, Department of Defense, American Association for Cancer Research, V Foundation for Cancer Research, Melanoma Research Foundation, Melanoma Research Alliance, Cancer Research Institute, Mathers Foundation, Conquer Cancer Foundation and Alliance for Cancer Gene Therapy.
Hanks earned his MD and PhD (tumor immunology) degrees through the Medical Scientist Training Program at Baylor College of Medicine before completing his internal medicine residency and hematology/oncology fellowship at Duke.
He has published more than 60 peer-reviewed scientific papers and has served in editorial roles with the Journal of Clinical Investigation, Frontiers in Immunology, Cancer Immunology Immunotherapy and Cancer Research.
His contributions to cancer research have earned him numerous awards, including the ASCO/CCF Advanced Clinical Research Award in Tumor Immunotherapy, Young Physician Scientist Awards from the American Society for Clinical Investigation, the Melanoma Research Alliance, and the Alliance for Cancer Gene Therapy. He was recently elected to the American Society for Clinical Investigation.