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John
Groopman
,
PhD

Edyth H. Schoenrich Professorship in Preventive Medicine
Professor
John Groopman

Departmental Affiliations

Joint
Division
Cancer Epidemiology

Center & Institute Affiliations

John Groopman, PhD, research involves the development and application of molecular biomarkers of exposure, dose, and effect from environmental carcinogens.

Contact Info

615 N. Wolfe Street, Room E7547
Baltimore
Maryland
21205
US        
410 955 0617

Research Interests

Environmental Health Sciences, Chemical carcinogenesis; environmental carcinogenesis; chemoprevention; cancer prevention and control
Experiences & Accomplishments
Education
PhD
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
1979
Overview
The research in my program involves the development and application of molecular biomarkers of exposure, dose, and effect from environmental carcinogens. The environmental carcinogens studied include agents that are naturally occurring in the diet as well as those produced as a result of cooking practices. A major emphasis of the research has been in the elucidation of the role of aflatoxins, a common contaminate of the food supply, in the induction of liver cancer in high-risk populations living in Asia and Africa. This work has led to the identification of a very strong chemical-viral interaction between aflatoxin and the human hepatitis B virus in the induction of liver cancer. These biomarkers have also been used in many collaborative molecular epidemiology studies of liver cancer risk and recently employed to assess the efficacy of a number of chemopreventive agents in trials in high-risk aflatoxin-hepatitis B virus exposed populations. This research is now being extended to develop genetic biomarkers of p53 mutations and viral alterations in human samples as early detection of disease biomarkers using a novel mass spectroscopy based method for genotyping developed in the laboratory. Thus, the research in our laboratory focuses on the translation of mechanistic research to public health based prevention strategies.
Honors & Awards
2016 Ronald B. Herberman Memorial Speaker for National Cancer Prevention Day
2010 AACR-Prevent Cancer Foundation Award for Excellence in Cancer Prevention Research Award
2008 Gerald N. Wogan Lecture, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
National Cancer Institute Research Career Development Award
Delta Omega Honor Society in Public Health, Alpha Chapter
Phi Beta Kappa
Select Publications
Most recent and publications highlighting student research.
  • Chen, J-G, Johnson, JL, Egner, PA, Ng, DK, Zhu, J, Wang, J-B, Xue, X-F, Sun, Y, Zhang, Y-H, Lu, L-L, Chen, Y-S, Wu, Y, Zhu, Y-R, Carmella, SG, Hecht, SS, Jacobson, LP, Muñoz, A, Kensler, KH, Rule, A M, Fahey, JW, Kensler, TW, and Groopman, JD. Dose-dependent detoxication of the airborne pollutant benzene in a randomized trial of broccoli sprout beverage in Qidong, China. American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, July 3 2019. 10.1093/ajcn/nqz12.
  • Groopman, JD. Environmental Health in the Biology Century: Transitions from Population to Personalized Prevention. Experimental Biology and Medicine, 244:728-733, 2019.
  • Brown, RH, Ng, DK, Steele, K. Schweitzer, M., and Groopman, JD. Mobilization of Environmental Toxicants Following Bariatric Surgery. Obesity, in press, 2019.
  • Koshiol, J., Gao, Y-T, Dean, M, Egner, PA, Nepal, C, Jones, K, Wang, B-S, Rashid, A, Luo, W, Van Dyke, A, Ferreccio, C, Malasky, M, Shen, M-C, Zhu, B, Andersen, JB, Hildesheim, A, Hsing, AW and Groopman, JD. Association Between Aflatoxin and Gallbladder Cancer in China. Gastroenterology, 153(2):488-494, 2017.
  • Livingstone, MC, Johnson, NM, Roebuck, BD, Kensler, TW and Groopman, JD. Profound changes in miRNA expression during cancer initiation by aflatoxin B1 and their abrogation by the chemopreventive triterpenoid CDDO-Im. Molecular Carcinogenesis, 56(11):2382-2390, 2017.
Projects
Liver Cancer, HBV and Aflatoxin
HIV and Hepatocellular Carcinoma in Uganda: H2U Consortium