Jesse Boehm, PhD, is the Chief Science Officer of Break Through Cancer, a novel foundation dedicated to urgently reimagining how we cure cancer by harnessing the power of extraordinary partnerships. With an initial $250M from private philanthropy, Break Through Cancer unites five leading cancer institutions: Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, Johns Hopkins Kimmel Cancer Center, University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, and MIT’s Koch Institute for Integrative Cancer Research, jointly focused on overcoming barriers impossible for any single organization to solve. The collective intention is to build an expansive member community of diverse partners committed to working together.
Dr. Boehm maintains a research lab at MIT’s Koch Institute focused on bringing the power of functional genomics to bear on living samples from cancer patients with particular emphasis on rare and underrepresented tumors.
Before transitioning to MIT, Dr. Boehm previously spent 14 years in the Broad Institute’s Cancer Program, most recently as an Institute Scientist and Scientific Director of the Cancer Dependency Map project. As the Director of the Broad’s Cancer Model Development Center (part of the National Cancer Institute’s Human Cancer Models Initiative), he led his laboratory in developing a scalable capacity to convert patient tumors into organoids and other cell models. Prior, he was the recipient of a Broad Institute Merkin Fellowship and the Associate Director of the Broad’s Cancer Program. In these leadership roles, he drove the scientific planning and strategic execution of a diverse set of program projects, collaborations, and activities for more than a decade.
Propelling the “cancer research ecosystem of the future” to benefit patients as rapidly as possible is his ultimate professional passion and ambition.
Dr. Boehm received his B.S. in biology from MIT and his PhD from Harvard University, Division of Medical Sciences at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute.
