Minkyung (Min) Song, Ph.D.
Program Director

Dr. Song joined Clinical Grants and Contracts Branch, Cancer Therapy Evaluation Program (CTEP), Division of Cancer Treatment and Diagnosis (DCTD), as a Program Director in September 2009. She is responsible for managing a portfolio of translational and clinical research grants and cooperative agreements in clinical oncology and surgical oncology of solid tumor malignancies. Example areas of research include: cancer pharmacogenomics; Phase 0, I, II, and III trials of treating patients with biological or chemical interventions, immunotherapies, surgery, or their combinations; molecular analyses of clinical specimens to identify biomarkers for monitoring and understanding effects of treatment, surrogate biomarkers, or specific targets for personalized treatment; drug-repositioning trials; and improving the survival of cancer patients. Dr. Song is a member of the NCI Pharmacogenomics and Pharmacoepidemiology Working Group, the NIH Pharmacogenomics Research Network (PGRN) CA Partnerships Working Group, and the NCI Evaluation Special Interest Group.

Prior to joining CTEP, Dr. Song served for 6 years as a Program Director in the Developmental Therapeutics Program, DCTD, where she managed an NCI grant portfolio of multidisciplinary, translational research in the discovery and preclinical development of new and improved anticancer agents. Dr. Song was also a Program Director for 6 years in the Cancer Diagnosis Program, DCTD, where she managed an NCI research grant portfolio of development and application of diagnostic devices and technologies including microfluidic devices and multi-analytes assays for diagnosis, prognosis, and prediction of responses to cancer therapies. As the Program Contact for several NCI initiatives, she managed and oversaw responses to these initiatives.

During her tenure in the NCI Extramural Research Program since October 1997, Dr. Song has been a contributing member of: the NIH Roadmap Clinical and Translational Science Awards Consortium, Translational Science Key Function Committee; the NIH Translational Research Interest Group; the NIH Roadmap Molecular Libraries and Imaging Implementation Group, Molecular Libraries Probe Production Centers Network Project Team and Predictive ADME and Toxicology Project Team; the NIH Proteomics Interest Group; and the NIH Korean Scientists Association. She participated in coordinating several large NIH-sponsored meetings and monthly seminar series, chaired sessions during these meetings, served as a Panelist at five international conferences, and delivered lectures on the NIH funding opportunities at twelve international meetings.

Dr. Song received the following honors and special recognitions in recent years:

• Certificate for successfully completing the NIH Senior Leadership Program (2010, pending)
• Certificate from NCI for successfully completing the Leadership Wisdom Series Program (2009)
• NIH Director's Award for "extraordinary scientific leadership of the Molecular Libraries and Imaging Roadmap to enable research on new pathways to discovery in health and disease" (2007)
• Young-Mae Award, Seoul, Korea (2005)

Dr. Song received her Ph.D. degree in Biochemistry and Molecular Biology from the University of Minnesota Medical School in 1983. She was the recipient of The Cyrus P. Barnum, Jr. Memorial Teaching Award from the Minnesota Medical Foundation in 1981 for her outstanding leadership for Teaching Assistants, and the Korean Honor Scholarship Award from Embassy of the Republic of Korea in 1982 in recognition of the highest achieving Korean graduate student in the United States.

Dr. Song was a Visiting Post-doctoral Fellow in the NCI Intramural Research Program for 3 years and a Senior Staff Fellow in the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases for 2.5 years. She utilized recombinant DNA techniques and approaches in animal studies, pharmacology, toxicology, cell biology, molecular biology, preparation and short-term culture of primary hepatocytes, biochemistry, enzymology, systems biology, genetics, genomics, proteomics, immunochemistry, lipid chemistry, and high-throughput assays to answer questions in cancer and metabolic diseases. She co-authored ten articles published in peer-reviewed scientific journals between 1983 and 1989.

Then, Dr. Song was an Interdisciplinary Review Scientist in the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for 9 years before joining the NCI Extramural Research Program. She prepared comprehensive written evaluations and recommendations based on her reviews of the documents (Chemistry, manufacturing and controls, pharmacology and toxicology information for recombinant DNA-derived drugs and biologics as well as chemical drugs including antibiotics and steroids; Analytical or biological assay validation reports; and Human food safety assessment reports for transgenic plants, fish, and other food animals) contained in Investigational New Drug applications, New Drug Applications, and other submissions to the FDA. She drafted four FDA "Guidance" and "Points to Consider" documents. She served as a scientist reviewer for the Biotechnology Evaluation Team, FDA. She also detailed to the Office of Women's Health, Intramural Grants Funding Program, Office of the Commissioner, FDA, where she served as the Program Director and described funded research projects in layman's language for publication.