Research Summary

Soonmee Cha, MD, is a Professor In Residence of Radiology and Neurological Surgery at the University of California, San Francisco. She is the Diagnostic Radiology Residency Program Director, and she is Radiology's Vice-Chair of Education. Dr. Cha has focused on the importance of validating the usefulness of MRI as a tool for brain tumor diagnosis, monitoring and identifying therapy endpoints. She obtained her medical degree from Georgetown University, School of Medicine, Washington in 1991. She completed her Diagnostic Radiology residency from North Shore University Hospital, Cornell University Medical College in New York, followed by a fellowship in Neuroradiology from New York University Medical Center in 1998.

Dr. Cha is committed to a career dedicated to patient-oriented research in the field of brain tumor imaging. She believes that non-invasive imaging technology will make important contributions to the health of patients through improving the specificity and precision of diagnosis and treatment monitoring, which will have significant impact on therapeutic decisions.

The main focus of Dr. Cha’s research is to identify reliable surrogate markers of prognosis and therapeutic efficacy by quantitative MR imaging methods in patients with brain tumors. She believes that by using MR imaging techniques such perfusion MR imaging, diffusion-weighted imaging, and 3-dimensional proton magnetic resonance spectroscopic imaging, detection of changes in tumor angiogenesis, cellularity, invasion, tumor hypoxia, and metabolic burden can be accurately measured and will provide more specific information about patient’s early response to therapy in the context of tumor growth.

Dr. Cha has been awarded several NIH grants, serving as Principal Investigator and Co-Principal Investigator on many NIH projects. She has published 87 articles, and she has written 77 peer-reviewed articles and 4 book chapters.

Expertise:
Neuroradiology

Specialty:
Brain tumor imaging

Professional Interests:
Brain tumor, brain cancer, glioblastoma multiforme, gliomas, primary cerebral lymphoma, angiogenesis, hypoxia, invasion, perfusion MR imaging, diffusion-weighted imaging, molecular imaging, biomarkers, microarray, genomics, neural stem cell

Education and Training:
• Medical School: Georgetown University, College of Arts and Sciences, Washington, District of Columbia
• Internship: Georgetown University Fairfax Hospital, Falls Church
• Residency: North Shore University Hospital, Cornell University Medical College, Manhasset, New York - Diagnostic Radiology
• Fellowship: New York University Medical Center, New York - Neuroradiology

Research Funding

  • August 1, 2003 - April 30, 2009 - Brain Tumor Imaging: Quantitative MRI and 1H MRS , Principal Investigator . Sponsor: NIH, Sponsor Award ID: K23NS045013

Education

Georgetown University, Washington, DC, B.S., 1983-1987, Chemistry
Georgetown University, Washington, DC, M.D., 1987-1991, Medicine
Georgetown University Hospital, Washington, DC, Internship, 1991-1992, Transitional Internship
North Shore University Hospital, Manhasset, NY, Residency, 1992-1996, Diagnostic Radiology
New York University Medical Center, New York, NY, Fellowship, 1996-1998, Neuroradiology

Honors & Awards

  • April 2000
    ASNR Outstanding Presentation Award in General Neuroradiology at the 38th Annual Meeting in Atlanta, GA.
  • 1995
    Certificate of Merit Award, Scientific exhibit at RSNA
  • 1994
    Certificate of Merit Award, Scientific exhibit at RSNA

Selected Publications

  1. Dietz CD, Deniz K, Fong JC, Cha S, Rankin KP, Lee SE, Geschwind MD, Windon CC. A single large-scale mitochondrial DNA deletion presenting as rapidly progressive dementia in a 35-year-old male. NPJ Dement. 2026; 2(1):25. View on PubMed
  2. Menna G, Al-Adli NN, Gerritsen JKW, Cha S, Berger MS, Young JS. Impact of Postoperative Diffuse-Weighted Imaging Rim Restriction on Neurological Outcomes After Resection of Newly Diagnosed Isocitrate Dehydrogenase-Wildtype Glioblastoma. Neurosurgery. 2026 Mar 31. View on PubMed
  3. Hu LS, Smits M, Kaufmann TJ, Knutsson L, Rapalino O, Galldiks N, Sundgren PC, Cha S. Reply to "Dynamic Susceptibility Contrast MRI for Evaluation of Patients With High-Grade Glioma: Need for Multicenter Clinical Trial Validation". AJR Am J Roentgenol. 2026 Jan; 226(1):e2533122. View on PubMed
  4. Bonham LW, Mendez JD, Zhou AL, Fields BKK, Ibrahim II, Sohn JH, Barkovich MJ, Cha S. Impact of a Resident-Driven Quality Improvement Project on Incidental Thyroid Nodule Follow-up-A Single Center Study. Acad Radiol. 2025 Dec; 32(12):7187-7192. View on PubMed
  5. Sánchez Boluarte AN, Farrell E, Wilson M, Bains J, O'Connell EM, Cha S, Chow FC. Persistent MRI Abnormalities After Successful Treatment of Subarachnoid and Intraventricular Neurocysticercosis: A Case Series. Neurol Clin Pract. 2025 Dec; 15(6):e200553. View on PubMed
  6. Zenk M, Baid U, Pati S, Linardos A, Edwards B, Sheller M, Foley P, Aristizabal A, Zimmerer D, Gruzdev A, Martin J, Shinohara RT, Reinke A, Isensee F, Parampottupadam S, Parekh K, Floca R, Kassem H, Baheti B, Thakur S, Chung V, Kushibar K, Lekadir K, Jiang M, Yin Y, Yang H, Liu Q, Chen C, Dou Q, Heng PA, Zhang X, Zhang S, Khan MI, Azeem MA, Jafaritadi M, Alhoniemi E, Kontio E, Khan SA, Mächler L, Ezhov I, Kofler F, Shit S, Paetzold JC, Loehr T, Wiestler B, Peiris H, Pawar K, Zhong S, Chen Z, Hayat M, Egan G, Harandi M, Isik Polat E, Polat G, Kocyigit A, Temizel A, Tuladhar A, Tyagi L, Souza R, Forkert ND, Mouches P, Wilms M, Shambhat V, Maurya A, Danannavar SS, Kalla R, Anand VK, Krishnamurthi G, Nalawade S, Ganesh C, Wagner B, Reddy D, Das Y, Yu FF, Fei B, Madhuranthakam AJ, Maldjian J, Singh G, Ren J, Zhang W, An N, Hu Q, Zhang Y, Zhou Y, Siomos V, Tarroni G, Passerrat-Palmbach J, Rawat A, Zizzo G, Kadhe SR, Epperlein JP, Braghin S, Wang Y, Kanagavelu R, Wei Q, Yang Y, Liu Y, Kotowski K, Adamski S, Machura B, Malara W, Zarudzki L, Nalepa J, Shi Y, Gao H, Avestimehr S, Yan Y, Akbar AS, Kondrateva E, Yang H, Li Z, Wu HY, Roth J, Saueressig C, Milesi A, Nguyen QD, Gruenhagen NJ, Huang TM, Ma J, Singh HSH, Pan NY, Zhang D, Zeineldin RA, Futrega M, Yuan Y, Conte GM, Feng X, Pham QD, Xia Y, Jiang Z, Luu HM, Dobko M, Carré A, Tuchinov B, Mohy-Ud-Din H, Alam S, Singh A, Shah N, Wang W, Sako C, Bilello M, Ghodasara S, Mohan S, Davatzikos C, Calabrese E, Rudie J, Villanueva-Meyer J, Cha S, Hess C, Mongan J, Ingalhalikar M, Jadhav M, Pandey U, Saini J, Huang RY, Chang K, To MS, Bhardwaj S, Chong C, Agzarian M, Kozubek M, Lux F, Michálek J, Matula P, Ker Kovský M, Kopr Ivová T, Dostál M, Vybíhal V, Pinho MC, Holcomb J, Metz M, Jain R, Lee MD, Lui YW, Tiwari P, Verma R, Bareja R, Yadav I, Chen J, Kumar N, Gusev Y, Bhuvaneshwar K, Sayah A, Bencheqroun C, Belouali A, Madhavan S, Colen RR, Kotrotsou A, Vollmuth P, Brugnara G, Preetha CJ, Sahm F, Bendszus M, Wick W, Mahajan A, Balaña C, Capellades J, Puig J, Choi YS, Lee SK, Chang JH, Ahn SS, Shaykh HF, Herrera-Trujillo A, Trujillo M, Escobar W, Abello A, Bernal J, Gómez J, LaMontagne P, Marcus DS, Milchenko M, Nazeri A, Landman B, Ramadass K, Xu K, Chotai S, Chambless LB, Mistry A, Thompson RC, Srinivasan A, Bapuraj JR, Rao A, Wang N, Yoshiaki O, Moritani T, Turk S, Lee J, Prabhudesai S, Garrett J, Larson M, Jeraj R, Li H, Weiss T, Weller M, Bink A, Pouymayou B, Sharma S, Tseng TC, Adabi S, Xavier Falcão A, Martins SB, Teixeira BCA, Sprenger F, Menotti D, Lucio DR, Niclou SP, Keunen O, Hau AC, Pelaez E, Franco-Maldonado H, Loayza F, Quevedo S, McKinley R, Slotboom J, Radojewski P, Meier R, Wiest R, Trenkler J, Pichler J, Necker G, Haunschmidt A, Meckel S, Guevara P, Torche E, Mendoza C, Vera F, Ríos E, López E, Velastin SA, Choi J, Baek S, Kim Y, Ismael H, Allen B, Buatti JM, Zampakis P, Panagiotopoulos V, Tsiganos P, Alexiou S, Haliassos I, Zacharaki EI, Moustakas K, Kalogeropoulou C, Kardamakis DM, Luo B, Poisson LM, Wen N, Vallières M, Loutfi MAL, Fortin D, Lepage M, Morón F, Mandel J, Shukla G, Liem S, Alexandre GS, Lombardo J, Palmer JD, Flanders AE, Dicker AP, Ogbole G, Oyekunle D, Odafe-Oyibotha O, Osobu B, Shu'aibu Hikima M, Soneye M, Dako F, Dorcas A, Murcia D, Fu E, Haas R, Thompson JA, Ormond DR, Currie S, Fatania K, Frood R, Simpson AL, Peoples JJ, Hu R, Cutler D, Moraes FY, Tran A, Hamghalam M, Boss MA, Gimpel J, Kattil Veettil D, Schmidt K, Cimino L, Price C, Bialecki B, Marella S, Apgar C, Jakab A, Weber MA, Colak E, Kleesiek J, Freymann JB, Kirby JS, Maier-Hein L, Albrecht J, Mattson P, Karargyris A, Shah P, Menze B, Maier-Hein K, Bakas S. Towards fair decentralized benchmarking of healthcare AI algorithms with the Federated Tumor Segmentation (FeTS) challenge. Nat Commun. 2025 Jul 08; 16(1):6274. View on PubMed
  7. Lee SH, Kim YS, Kim MB, Cha SM, Kang HJ, Lee YH, Kim YK, Chung HJ. The concentric circles method to define and assess anterior subluxation in bony mallet finger. J Hand Surg Eur Vol. 2025 Dec; 50(11):1516-1522. View on PubMed
  8. Barrios J, Porter E, Capaldi DPI, Upadhaya T, Chen WC, Perks JR, Apte A, Aristophanous M, LoCastro E, Hsu D, Stone PH, Villanueva-Meyer JE, Valdes G, Jiang F, Maddalena M, Ballangrud A, Prezelski K, Lin H, Sun JY, Aldin MAK, Chau OW, Ziemer B, Seaberg M, Sneed PK, Nakamura JL, Boreta LC, Fogh SE, Raleigh DR, Chew J, Vasudevan H, Cha S, Hess C, Fragoso R, Shultz DB, Pike L, Hervey-Jumper SL, Tsang DS, Theodosopoulos P, Cooke D, Benedict SH, Sheng K, Seuntjens J, Coolens C, Deasy JO, Braunstein S, Morin O. Author Correction: Multi-institutional atlas of brain metastases informs spatial modeling for precision imaging and personalized therapy. Nat Commun. 2025 Jun 02; 16(1):5096. View on PubMed
  9. Barrios J, Porter E, Capaldi DPI, Upadhaya T, Chen WC, Perks JR, Apte A, Aristophanous M, LoCastro E, Hsu D, Stone PH, Villanueva-Meyer JE, Valdes G, Jiang F, Maddalena M, Ballangrud A, Prezelski K, Lin H, Sun JY, Aldin MAK, Chau OW, Ziemer B, Seaberg M, Sneed PK, Nakamura JL, Boreta LC, Fogh SE, Raleigh DR, Chew J, Vasudevan H, Cha S, Hess C, Fragoso R, Shultz DB, Pike L, Hervey-Jumper SL, Tsang DS, Theodosopoulos P, Cooke D, Benedict SH, Sheng K, Seuntjens J, Coolens C, Deasy JO, Braunstein S, Morin O. Multi-institutional atlas of brain metastases informs spatial modeling for precision imaging and personalized therapy. Nat Commun. 2025 May 15; 16(1):4536. View on PubMed
  10. Guney E, Mirchia K, Schmid S, Capper D, Meinhardt J, Cha S, Lee H, Brathwaite C, Altman N, Sloan EA, Sayah A, McGrail K, Caliskan I, Terry M, Perez S, Bollen AW, Tihan T, Pekmezci M, Perry A. CNS angiocentric stromal tumor (CAST), PDGFRA-mutant, a novel entity histologically mimicking meningioangiomatosis and radiologically correlating with giant Virchow-Robin spaces. Acta Neuropathol. 2025 Apr 11; 149(1):33. View on PubMed
  11. Hu LS, Smits M, Kaufmann TJ, Knutsson L, Rapalino O, Galldiks N, Sundgren PC, Cha S. Advanced Imaging in the Diagnosis and Response Assessment of High-Grade Glioma: AJR Expert Panel Narrative Review. AJR Am J Roentgenol. 2025 Jan; 224(1):e2330612. View on PubMed
  12. Zhou MH, Cha S. MYCN-amplified spinal ependymomas: a rare aggressive subtype. Illustrative cases. J Neurosurg Case Lessons. 2025 Jan 06; 9(1). View on PubMed
  13. Cha SM, Nho JH, Ga IH, Kim YH. A Novel Technique With Buttress Plating for Comminuted Base Fractures of the Proximal Phalanx. Ann Plast Surg. 2025 Feb 01; 94(2):169-176. View on PubMed
  14. Isikbay M, Caton MT, Narvid J, Talbott J, Cha S, Calabrese E. Deep learning segmentation-based bone removal from computed tomography of the brain improves subdural hematoma detection. J Neuroradiol. 2025 Feb; 52(1):101231. View on PubMed
  15. Terry M, Nguyen MP, Tang V, Guney E, Bharani KL, Dahiya S, Choutka O, Borys E, Reis G, Blevins L, Aghi MK, Kunwar S, DeGroot J, Raleigh DR, Pekmezci M, Bollen AW, Cha S, Joseph NM, Perry A. High-Grade Progression, Sarcomatous Transformation, and/or Metastasis of Pituitary Neuroendocrine Neoplasms (PitNENs): The UCSF Experience. Endocr Pathol. 2024 Dec; 35(4):338-348. View on PubMed
  16. Fields BKK, Calabrese E, Mongan J, Cha S, Hess CP, Sugrue LP, Chang SM, Luks TL, Villanueva-Meyer JE, Rauschecker AM, Rudie JD. The University of California San Francisco Adult Longitudinal Post-Treatment Diffuse Glioma MRI Dataset. Radiol Artif Intell. 2024 07; 6(4):e230182. View on PubMed
  17. Cha SM, Lee SH, Ga IH, Kim YH, Lee SH. Usefulness of multiple bioabsorbable Mg screws/K‑wires for comminuted radial head fractures. Int Orthop. 2024 Aug; 48(8):2165-2177. View on PubMed
  18. Cha SM, Lee SH, Ga IH, Kim YH. Locking plate fixation in comminuted coronoid fractures with partial loss of the articular cartilage - Of basal-1 type according to the O'Driscoll classification. Injury. 2024 Jun; 55(6):111550. View on PubMed
  19. Cha SM, Shin HD, Ga IH, Kim YH. Certain fracture patterns in children/adolescents would be better called 'Barton equivalent' fractures. J Pediatr Orthop B. 2025 Mar 01; 34(2):134-141. View on PubMed
  20. Reddy S, Cha S, LaHue SC. Clinical Reasoning: A 22-Year-Old Man With Multifocal Brain and Osseous Lesions. Neurology. 2023 11 27; 101(22):1025-1031. View on PubMed

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