Scott VandenBerg, MD, PhD, is the director of the Tissue Core Facility at UCSF Helen Diller Family Comprehensive Cancer Center, with extensive experience developing tissue-based biomarker techniques and directing biorepositories for the optimal acquisition, archiving, annotation, and custodianship of human tissue for cancer research. Dr. VandenBerg’s technical expertise in molecular morphology include immunohistochemistry/immunofluorescence and molecular in situ analyses.
Since 2008, a major emphasis of his technical research core activities has been to develop more quantitative detection of biomarkers of activated signaling pathways in a wide spectrum of human disease, focusing on cancer. His translational research focuses on the application of multiple proteomic, epigenetic, and genetic techniques for the molecular morphologic analysis of biomarkers in CNS tumor sections. The technologies include processing techniques for tissue to preserve analyte quality for RNA, DNA, and proteomics with optimal histologic quality and multiple detection modalities on tissue sections for biomarker multiplexing in heterogeneous tumors, including the genomic and proteomic characterization of prognostic markers in CNS tumors.
Dr. VandenBerg directed the establishment of a tissue technology laboratory to optimize the use of quantitative immunofluorescence detection techniques for combined IF/ISH analyses and for the multiplex analysis of inter-related signaling pathways in human tissue, focusing on cancer. Prior to joining UCSF, Dr. VandenBerg was director of the UCSD Moores Comprehensive Center Biorepository, Histopathology, and Tissue Technology Shared Resource.