Research Summary

Dr. Molinaro's research interest and expertise are focused on developing and implementing statistical and machine learning methods in cancer research, spanning basic research, translational, and clinical studies. In her current roles as the Director of Biomedical Statistics and Informatics for the UCSF Department of Neurological Surgery and Biostatistics Core Director for both the Brain SPORE and Program Project, Dr. Molinaro advises study design and modeling, and analyzes data from all UCSF Brain Tumor Center projects in imaging, genetics, genomics, epidemiology and immunology. She is the co-PI of the Brain SPORE Project to develop immune profile markers for risk prediction in glioblastoma patients and the co-PI of the Program Project Project to use machine learning and AI to develop spatial maps of risk from anatomical, physiological, and metabolic images. Dr. Molinaro has over one-hundred and fifty publications in addition to authoring three book chapters and several freely available software packages for the analysis of high-dimensional data. Dr. Molinaro is an elected Board of Directors Member for the Society of Neuro-Oncology as well as an elected member of the International Statistical Institute, an Associate Editor for NeuroOncology Practice and Editor for the 'Series on Biostatistics for the Practicing Clinician" for NeuroOncology Practice.

Research Funding

  • September 20, 2002 - August 31, 2023 - Brain Tumor SPORE Grant, Co-Investigator. Sponsor: NIH/NCI, Sponsor Award ID: P50CA097257
  • June 1, 2006 - August 31, 2017 - Yale SPORE in Skin Cancer, Co-Investigator. Sponsor: NIH, Sponsor Award ID: P50CA121974
  • July 10, 2012 - April 30, 2016 - Novel Tree-based Statistical Methods for Cancer Risk Prediction, Principal Investigator. Sponsor: NIH/NCI, Sponsor Award ID: R01CA163687
  • July 6, 2006 - June 30, 2009 - Statistical Methods for Predicting Survival Outcomes from Genomic Data, Principal Investigator. Sponsor: NIH/NCI, Sponsor Award ID: K22CA123146

Education

Florida State University, Tallahassee, FL BS, 05/92, Statistics
University of California, Berkeley, CA, MA, 05/00, Biostatistics
University of California, Berkeley, CA, PhD, 01/04, Biostatistics
National Cancer Institute, Rockville, MD, 06/04-06/05, Cancer Prevention / Biostatistics

Honors & Awards

  • 2004
    Evelyn Fix Prize, University of California, Berkeley
  • 2004
    Chin Long Chiang Biostatistics Student of the Year, University of California, Berkeley
  • 2006
    Elected as a Member of the International Statistical Institute.
  • 2008
    Teacher of the Year Award, Yale University School of Public Health
  • 2009
    Selected as a Yale Center for Clinical Investigation Scholar, Yale University School of Medicine
  • 2013
    Diane D. Ralston Clinical and Basic Neuroscience Teaching Award, UCSF
  • 2017
    Selected for the Teaching Scholars Program, UCSF

Selected Publications

  1. Ammanuel SG, Almeida NC, Kurteff G, Kakaizada S, Molinaro AM, Berger MS, Chang EF, Hervey-Jumper SL. Correlation of natural language assessment results with health-related quality of life in adult glioma patients. J Neurosurg. 2021 Jul 30; 1-7.  View on PubMed
  2. Bush NAO, Young JS, Zhang Y, Dalle Ore CL, Molinaro AM, Taylor J, Clarke J, Prados M, Braunstein SE, Raleigh DR, Chang SM, Berger MS, Butowski NA. A single institution retrospective analysis on survival based on treatment paradigms for patients with anaplastic oligodendroglioma. J Neurooncol. 2021 Jul; 153(3):447-454.  View on PubMed
  3. Pekmezci M, Morshed RA, Chunduru P, Pandian B, Young J, Villanueva-Meyer JE, Tihan T, Sloan EA, Aghi MK, Molinaro AM, Berger MS, Hervey-Jumper SL. Detection of glioma infiltration at the tumor margin using quantitative stimulated Raman scattering histology. Sci Rep. 2021 06 09; 11(1):12162.  View on PubMed
  4. Badiee RK, Chan AK, Rivera J, Molinaro A, Chou D, Mummaneni PV, Tan LA. Smoking Is an Independent Risk Factor for 90-Day Readmission and Reoperation Following Posterior Cervical Decompression and Fusion. Neurosurgery. 2021 05 13; 88(6):1088-1094.  View on PubMed
  5. Muster RH, Young JS, Woo PYM, Morshed RA, Warrier G, Kakaizada S, Molinaro AM, Berger MS, Hervey-Jumper SL. The Relationship Between Stimulation Current and Functional Site Localization During Brain Mapping. Neurosurgery. 2021 05 13; 88(6):1043-1050.  View on PubMed
  6. Avadiappan S, Morrison MA, Jakary A, Felton E, Stoller S, Hess CP, Molinaro AM, Braunstein SE, Mueller S, Lupo JM. Relationship between 7T MR-angiography features of vascular injury and cognitive decline in young brain tumor patients treated with radiation therapy. J Neurooncol. 2021 May; 153(1):143-152.  View on PubMed
  7. Yu Y, Villanueva-Meyer J, Grimmer MR, Hilz S, Solomon DA, Choi S, Wahl M, Mazor T, Hong C, Shai A, Phillips JJ, Wainer BH, McDermott M, Haas-Kogan D, Taylor JW, Butowski N, Clarke JL, Berger MS, Molinaro AM, Chang SM, Costello JF, Oberheim Bush NA. Temozolomide-induced hypermutation is associated with distant recurrence and reduced survival after high-grade transformation of low-grade IDH-mutant gliomas. Neuro Oncol. 2021 Apr 05.  View on PubMed
  8. Wiencke JK, Zhang Z, Koestler DC, Salas LA, Molinaro AM, Christensen BC, Kelsey KT. Identification of a foetal epigenetic compartment in adult human kidney. Epigenetics. 2021 Mar 30; 1-21.  View on PubMed
  9. Mueller S, Taitt JM, Villanueva-Meyer JE, Bonner ER, Nejo T, Lulla RR, Goldman S, Banerjee A, Chi SN, Whipple NS, Crawford JR, Gauvain K, Nazemi KJ, Watchmaker PB, Almeida ND, Okada K, Salazar AM, Gilbert RD, Nazarian J, Molinaro AM, Butterfield LH, Prados MD, Okada H. Mass cytometry detects H3.3K27M-specific vaccine responses in diffuse midline glioma. J Clin Invest. 2020 12 01; 130(12):6325-6337.  View on PubMed
  10. Eckel-Passow JE, Drucker KL, Kollmeyer TM, Kosel ML, Decker PA, Molinaro AM, Rice T, Praska CE, Clark L, Caron A, Abyzov A, Batzler A, Song JS, Pekmezci M, Hansen HM, McCoy LS, Bracci PM, Wiemels J, Wiencke JK, Francis S, Burns TC, Giannini C, Lachance DH, Wrensch M, Jenkins RB. Adult diffuse glioma GWAS by molecular subtype identifies variants in D2HGDH and FAM20C. Neuro Oncol. 2020 11 26; 22(11):1602-1613.  View on PubMed
  11. Mathur R, Zhang Y, Grimmer MR, Hong C, Zhang M, Bollam S, Petrecca K, Clarke J, Berger MS, Phillips JJ, Oberheim-Bush NA, Molinaro AM, Chang SM, Costello JF. MGMT promoter methylation level in newly diagnosed low-grade glioma is a predictor of hypermutation at recurrence. Neuro Oncol. 2020 11 26; 22(11):1580-1590.  View on PubMed
  12. Nayak L, Molinaro AM, Peters K, Clarke JL, Jordan JT, de Groot J, Nghiemphu L, Kaley T, Colman H, McCluskey C, Gaffey S, Smith TR, Cote DJ, Severgnini M, Yearley JH, Zhao Q, Blumenschein WM, Duda DG, Muzikansky A, Jain RK, Wen PY, Reardon DA. Randomized Phase II and Biomarker Study of Pembrolizumab plus Bevacizumab versus Pembrolizumab Alone for Patients with Recurrent Glioblastoma. Clin Cancer Res. 2021 02 15; 27(4):1048-1057.  View on PubMed
  13. Schulte JD, Buerki RA, Lapointe S, Molinaro AM, Zhang Y, Villanueva-Meyer JE, Perry A, Phillips JJ, Tihan T, Bollen AW, Pekmezci M, Butowski N, Oberheim Bush NA, Taylor JW, Chang SM, Theodosopoulos P, Aghi MK, Hervey-Jumper SL, Berger MS, Solomon DA, Clarke JL. Clinical, radiologic, and genetic characteristics of histone H3 K27M-mutant diffuse midline gliomas in adults. Neurooncol Adv. 2020 Jan-Dec; 2(1):vdaa142.  View on PubMed
  14. Cluceru J, Nelson SJ, Wen Q, Phillips JJ, Shai A, Molinaro AM, Alcaide-Leon P, Olson MP, Nair D, LaFontaine M, Chunduru P, Villanueva-Meyer JE, Cha S, Chang SM, Berger MS, Lupo JM. Recurrent tumor and treatment-induced effects have different MR signatures in contrast enhancing and non-enhancing lesions of high-grade gliomas. Neuro Oncol. 2020 10 14; 22(10):1516-1526.  View on PubMed
  15. Mummaneni PV, Burke JF, Chan AK, Sosa JA, Lobo EP, Mummaneni VP, Antrum S, Berven SH, Conte MS, Doernberg SB, Goldberg AN, Hess CP, Hetts SW, Josephson SA, Kohi MP, Ma CB, Mahadevan VS, Molinaro AM, Murr AH, Narayana S, Roberts JP, Stoller ML, Theodosopoulos PV, Vail TP, Wienholz S, Gropper MA, Green A, Berger MS. Consensus-based perioperative protocols during the COVID-19 pandemic. J Neurosurg Spine. 2020 Oct 02; 1-9.  View on PubMed
  16. Morrison MA, Mueller S, Felton E, Jakary A, Stoller S, Avadiappan S, Yuan J, Molinaro AM, Braunstein S, Banerjee A, Hess CP, Lupo JM. Rate of radiation-induced microbleed formation on 7T MRI relates to cognitive impairment in young patients treated with radiation therapy for a brain tumor. Radiother Oncol. 2021 01; 154:145-153.  View on PubMed
  17. Nicolaides T, Nazemi KJ, Crawford J, Kilburn L, Minturn J, Gajjar A, Gauvain K, Leary S, Dhall G, Aboian M, Robinson G, Long-Boyle J, Wang H, Molinaro AM, Mueller S, Prados M. Phase I study of vemurafenib in children with recurrent or progressive BRAFV600E mutant brain tumors: Pacific Pediatric Neuro-Oncology Consortium study (PNOC-002). Oncotarget. 2020 May 26; 11(21):1942-1952.  View on PubMed
  18. Morshed RA, Reihl SJ, Molinaro AM, Kakaizada S, Young JS, Schulte JD, Butowski N, Taylor J, Bush NA, Aghi MK, Berger MS, Chang S, Clarke J, Hervey-Jumper SL. The influence of race and socioeconomic status on therapeutic clinical trial screening and enrollment. J Neurooncol. 2020 May; 148(1):131-139.  View on PubMed
  19. Safaee MM, Tenorio A, Osorio JA, Choy W, Amara D, Lai L, Molinaro AM, Zhang Y, Hu SS, Tay B, Burch S, Berven SH, Deviren V, Dhall SS, Chou D, Mummaneni PV, Eichler CM, Ames CP, Clark AJ. The impact of obesity on perioperative complications in patients undergoing anterior lumbar interbody fusion. J Neurosurg Spine. 2020 Apr 24; 1-10.  View on PubMed
  20. Molinaro AM, Hervey-Jumper S, Morshed RA, Young J, Han SJ, Chunduru P, Zhang Y, Phillips JJ, Shai A, Lafontaine M, Crane J, Chandra A, Flanigan P, Jahangiri A, Cioffi G, Ostrom Q, Anderson JE, Badve C, Barnholtz-Sloan J, Sloan AE, Erickson BJ, Decker PA, Kosel ML, LaChance D, Eckel-Passow J, Jenkins R, Villanueva-Meyer J, Rice T, Wrensch M, Wiencke JK, Oberheim Bush NA, Taylor J, Butowski N, Prados M, Clarke J, Chang S, Chang E, Aghi M, Theodosopoulos P, McDermott M, Berger MS. Association of Maximal Extent of Resection of Contrast-Enhanced and Non-Contrast-Enhanced Tumor With Survival Within Molecular Subgroups of Patients With Newly Diagnosed Glioblastoma. JAMA Oncol. 2020 04 01; 6(4):495-503.  View on PubMed

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