Dr. rer. nat. Dennis Castor
Senior Scientific Consultant
Lead Quality Assurance Unit
Dr. Castor holds a degree in biology from the Friedrich-Alexander University Erlangen Nuremberg where he graduated at the Institute of Molecular Immunology in 2005. During his doctorate (2005-2009) at the Institute of Molecular Cancer Research at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology/University of Zurich he focused on DNA repair mechanisms in health and disease. He continued his work as a postdoctoral researcher at the MRC Protein Phosphorylation and Ubiquitylation Unit in Dundee, Scotland, until 2013. Returning to Germany, he obtained additional training in project management (certified by GPM/IPMA®, Level D) and started as a project manager at MEDA Pharma GmbH & Co. KG (a Mylan company) focusing on late phase clinical research and non-clinical research. Joining the team at IKF in January 2019, Dr. Castor works as a Senior Scientific Consultant advising on scientific and organizational aspects throughout the project life cycle. He also leads the Quality Assurance Unit helping to maintain the high standards at the IKF.
Biosketch Prof. Al-Batran
Biosketch Prof. Salah-Eddin Al-Batran
Prof. Salah-Eddin Al-Batran is current Director of the Institute of Clinical Cancer Research, a joint foundation of the University Cancer Center (UCT), Frankfurt and Northwest Hospital in Frankfurt. He is also Head of Gastrointestinal Cancer Center at the Northwest Hospital. Prof. Al-Batran is Member of the Board of Directors of the University Cancer Center, a German Cancer Aid (Krebshilfe) certified Comprehensive Cancer Center (CCC) of Excellence.
Prof. Al-Batran is board-certified Hematologist and Oncologist. Further experiences include Internal Medicine (board-certified), Palliative Medicine (board-certified), and Pain Management (board certified). He received his medical degree from the Ludwig-Maximilian-University in Munich. After the completion of an internship and residency in internal medicine, Prof. Al-Batran completed fellowships in Hematology and Oncology, in Frankfurt. Since 2014, he is full professor (APL) at the Goethe-University of Frankfurt.
Prof. Al-Batran is an internationally recognized clinical researcher and expert in the field of Gastrointestinal Cancer. His clinical research interest has been particularly focused on esophageal and gastric cancer. In his Institute, Prof. Al-Batran guides a comprehensive clinical and translational research program, focusing on gaining a better understanding of the development and treatment of cancer. His works have gained international recognition and led to registrational phase-III studies (as for the IMAB362 antibody) and/or have been considered in guidelines such as the German S3- or NCCN/ESMO-Guidelines (as for the perioperative FLOT therapy). His special clinical interests include Multimodality Treatment, Oligometastatic Disease, Precision Medicine, Immuno-Oncology, and Patient Reported Outcome.
Prof. Al-Batran is Founder and Chair of FLOT Upper GI Cancer Study Group, which comprises more than 200 medical centers located in Germany and European Union. The network that was founded by Prof. Al-Batran in 2001 emerged as one of largest clinical study networks world-wide. Prof. Al-Batran was also the chairman of the Gastric/esophageal Cancer Working Group of the AIO for seven years and chairman of the Quality of Life/PRO Working Group for three years. He is member of the Educational Steering Committee of the European Society for Medical Oncology (ESMO) and German Representative in the American National Cancer Institute (NCI) Upper GI Task Force. Prof. Al-Batran is member of numerous other global scientific committees. He is coordinating investigator or protocol committee member of multiple international phase III studies and active member of several professional organizations, including the German Society of Clinical Oncology (AIO), the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO), and the European Organization for Research and Treatment of Cancer (EORTC). Al-Batran has written several books and published many original articles in reputed journals such as the Journal of Clinical Oncology, Lancet, JAMA, Lancet Oncology, JAMA Oncology, Annals of Oncology, Cancer, and Cancer Research. The mean impact factor of his original articles is 10.2 (by December 2018). The number of PubMed-cited articles is 128 (by December 2018). Prof. Al-Batran successfully achieved significant third-party funding form most important public organizations such as Deutsche Krebshilfe, DFG, BMBF and from almost all global pharmaceutical companies.
Prof. Al-Batran is teacher of Internal Medicine at the Goethe-University of Frankfurt. He has given numerous lectures at national and international symposia and conferences including several oral presentations and late-breaking abstracts at the ASCO, ESMO, ESMO GI, and ASCO GI annual meetings. In 2008, Prof. Al-Batran was awarded with the AIO Science Award by the German Cancer Society in Berlin. In 2017, he received the Bengt Glimelius Honorary Award in Stockholm.
Prof. Al-Batran’s vision is to cure metastatic cancer by integrating immunotherapy and precision medicine into multimodality therapy of localized and oligometastatic cancer. For this, Prof. Al-Batran is currently conducting eight parallel, randomized clinical studies and several large-scale, translational projects.