Lindsay Brubaker, MD

Lindsay Brubaker, MD is an Assistant Professor in the Division of Gynecologic Oncology at the University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus. Dr. Brubaker completed her residency in Obstetrics and Gynecology at Stanford University, then moved to Denver, Colorado for Fellowship in Gynecologic Oncology. Upon graduation, she chose to join the University of Colorado Division of Gynecologic Oncology with the goal of providing exceptional clinical and surgical care, as well as building an independent research career focused on platinum resistant ovarian cancer. During her first year of fellowship Dr. Brubaker worked under the mentorship of ovarian cancer biologist, Dr. Benjamin Bitler, to identify drivers of high-grade serous carcinoma dissemination and progression. In the course of this work, she identified Chromobox 2 (CBX2), an epigenetic reader and a component of the polycomb repressor complex, as a regulator of disease progression and chemotherapy resistance. This work found that inhibition of CBX2 re-sensitizes high grade serous carcinoma to platinum therapy and more recently discovered that CBX2 overexpression in high grade serous carcinoma cells is sufficient to promote chemoresistance. Dr. Brubaker’s current focus is to define the impact of CBX2 modulation on the tumor microenvironment (TME) in high grade serous carcinoma. She will use innovative technology, including NanoString and Vectra Polaris multispectral immunohistochemistry, to define the TME with a focus on macrophage recruitment and differentiation. Once the TME is defined, Dr. Brubaker will use syngeneic mouse models to elucidate the role of CBX2 on the TME and explore the potential for CBX2 inhibition alone and in combination with existing immunotherapies. She is hopeful this work will pave the way to bring a CBX2 inhibitor to clinical trial. In addition to her translational endeavors, Dr. Brubaker has a variety of clinical research interests, including decision making in platinum resistant disease and creation of an institutional database of patients undergoing hyperthermic intraperitoneal chemotherapy as part of their treatment for ovarian cancer.