# Luis A. Diaz Jr.

Source: https://onco.cc/people/luis-diaz/  
OnCo record `luis-diaz` (Person). Data CC BY-NC 4.0, attribute "Data from OnCo (onco.cc)"; commercial use needs a licence.

## TL;DR

Co-led the work that made pembrolizumab the first tumour-agnostic cancer drug approval, for mismatch-repair-deficient tumours.

## Summary

Trained at Johns Hopkins with Vogelstein and Kinzler, where he co-founded Personal Genome Diagnostics and helped establish circulating tumour DNA as a clinical tool. The 2015 and 2017 studies of PD-1 blockade in dMMR tumours led to the 2017 tissue-agnostic approval of pembrolizumab. At MSK he co-led the dostarlimab rectal cancer programme.

## Fields

- Kind: Person
- Last checked: 2026-09-08
- Role: Head, Division of Solid Tumor Oncology
- Specialisms: MSI-high / dMMR tumours; Immunotherapy; Liquid biopsy; Colorectal cancer

## Sources

- PubMed: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/?term=Diaz%20LA%20Jr%5BAuthor%5D

## Connected records

- cancers: [Colorectal cancer](https://onco.cc/cancers/colorectal/), [Mismatch-repair deficient (MSI-high) colorectal cancer](https://onco.cc/cancers/msi-high-colorectal/), [Rectal cancer](https://onco.cc/cancers/rectal-cancer/)
- technologies: [Immune checkpoint inhibitors](https://onco.cc/technologies/checkpoint-inhibitor/), [Liquid biopsy (ctDNA)](https://onco.cc/technologies/liquid-biopsy/)
- targets: [PD-1](https://onco.cc/targets/pd1/)
- drugs: [Dostarlimab](https://onco.cc/drugs/dostarlimab/), [Pembrolizumab](https://onco.cc/drugs/pembrolizumab/)
- institutions: [Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center](https://onco.cc/institutions/mskcc/)
- key papers: [A combination of molecular markers and clinical features improve the classification of pancreatic cysts](https://onco.cc/key-papers/paper-springer-pancreatic-cyst-molecular-classification-gastroenterology-2015/), [Cercek 2022: six months of dostarlimab alone made rectal cancer disappear in every patient with mismatch-repair deficiency](https://onco.cc/key-papers/paper-cercek-dostarlimab-rectal-nejm-2022/), [KEYNOTE-177: pembrolizumab instead of chemotherapy as first treatment for mismatch-repair-deficient metastatic colorectal cancer](https://onco.cc/key-papers/paper-keynote-177-nejm-2020/), [Le 2015: PD-1 blockade works in tumours with mismatch-repair deficiency, whatever the organ](https://onco.cc/key-papers/paper-le-mmr-deficiency-pd1-nejm-2015/), [Le 2017: mismatch-repair deficiency predicts response to PD-1 blockade across twelve tumour types, leading to the first tissue-agnostic drug approval](https://onco.cc/key-papers/paper-le-mmr-deficiency-science-2017/), [Recurrent GNAS mutations define an unexpected pathway for pancreatic cyst development](https://onco.cc/key-papers/paper-wu-gnas-ipmn-sci-transl-med-2011/), [The molecular evolution of acquired resistance to targeted EGFR blockade in colorectal cancers](https://onco.cc/key-papers/paper-diaz-molecular-evolution-egfr-resistance-colorectal-nature-2012/)

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