Biography

Kelli M. Wilson, Ph.D., is the director of the Compound Management group in the Information Technology and Research Branch, Research Services Core, within NCATS’ Division of Preclinical Innovation (DPI), where she focuses on collaboration with NCATS scientists who require compounds for screening and other translational science projects. Her role involves compound acquisition, automation and liquid handling process development and consultation for various specialized projects. Additionally, she leads multiple projects related to data science and data-sharing initiatives within DPI.

Wilson joined NCATS in 2014 as a postdoctoral fellow under Craig J. Thomas, Ph.D. In this capacity, she conducted research projects using NCATS’ drug combination screening platform to find novel therapies for various cancer indications. These successful projects resulted in initiation of a clinical trial for a marizomib and panobinostat combination therapy for diffuse intrinsic pontine glioma patients (NCT04341311) and collaborations with clinicians using the combination of M6620 with topotecan to treat small cell lung cancer (NCT0248709). Additionally, Wilson’s data science projects have focused on sharing NCATS screening data with various partners (e.g., the National Cancer Institute) to facilitate further research.

Wilson earned her doctorate in cellular and molecular medicine from The Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine and her Bachelor’s degree in biological sciences from North Carolina State University. Her doctoral research focused on using patient-derived brain tumor cell lines for high-throughput screening to find novel therapeutics for glioblastoma.

Watch this video (video length: 2:48) to learn how the NCATS Compound Management group supports researchers via compound storage, registration, shipping and reformatting. A version of this video with audio description is available.

Research Topics

Wilson’s research is focused on compound acquisition, annotation and distribution in support of NCATS’ scientific staff; novel drug combination therapies for oncology indications; and assay annotation and data sharing.