Dr. Milind M. Pore completed his Ph.D. research in lung cancer at the University of Groningen, the Netherlands, in 2016. He worked with Prof. Frank Kruyt and oncologist Jeroen Hiltermann on understanding the role of circulating tumor cells (CTCs), epithelial-to-mesenchymal transition (EMT), and cancer stem cells (CSCs) in lung cancer metastasis. Porealso worked in Pune, India, at a start-up firm, Actorius Innovations and Research, with Prof. Jayant Khandare to design the CTC detection platform. During his postdoctoral training at the University of Southern California, Los Angeles, he worked with Prof. Peter Kuhn and Prof. James Hicks on multiplex proteomics profiling of CTCs from solid tumors by using imaging mass cytometry. He developed and optimized assays for high-dimensional analysis of rare cells from blood samples for their EMT, CSC, proliferation, dormancy, and immune cell marker profiling. Pore is interested in employing his skills in imaging mass cytometry to understand high-dimensional analyses of formalin-fixed, paraffin-embedded and fresh-frozen tissue samples to elucidate how the microenvironment and the interactions between cancer and immune cells are involved in cancer progression.
