Chang Lab

Long-Sheng Chang, PhD
Principal Investigator

Dr. Chang received his bachelor's degree from National Taiwan University and his Ph.D. degree from Rutgers University-New Jersey Medical School. Subsequently, he did a postdoctoral training at Princeton University. In June 1990, Dr. Chang joined the faculty at The Research Institute at Nationwide Children’s Hospital and The Ohio State University (OSU) College of Medicine. Currently he is a principal investigator in the Center for Childhood Cancer and a Professor in the OSU Department of Pediatrics. Also, he has adjunct appointment to the Departments of Biological Chemistry & Pharmacology, Otolaryngology, Pathology, and Veterinary Bioscience, Molecular Cellular & Developmental Biology (MCDB) Program, Ohio State Biochemistry Program (OSBP), and Biomedical Sciences Graduate Program (BSGP).

Dr. Chang’s lab has been studying neurofibromatosis (NF), a group of genetic diseases that predispose individuals to the development of multiple nervous system tumors and other debilitating manifestations. Due to limited treatment options, these NF-associated tumors caused significant morbidity and mortality. Therefore, the objective of his research is to develop efficacious medical therapies, ultimately leading to substantial improvement of clinical care and long-term treatment outcomes for these patients. To achieve this goal, Dr. Chang’s team has identified some novel functions of the NF2 tumor suppressor gene and investigated potential druggable targets. Also, Dr. Chang’s lab has generated several cell culture and animal models for NF-associated tumors and used them to identify novel targeted drugs or drug combinations that potently suppress tumor growth. As most NF-associated tumors are slow-growing tumors and could not be grown directly as patient-derived xenografts, they have established a series of isogenic NF2-deficient and NF2-expressing Schwann and meningeal cell lines as well as schwannoma and meningioma cell lines bearing patient-specific mutations to enhance therapeutic evaluation.

Janet L. Oblinger, PhD
Research Associate
Janet.Oblinger@NationwideChildrens.org

I perform benchwork, mostly comprising cell and molecular biology techniques. My current interests are focused upon the investigation of the pathways that drive growth in meningioma & schwannoma cells. The identified deregulated pathways then provide useful leads for new medical therapies. These therapeutic candidates can be novel pharmacological compounds that are in the preclinical/early clinical trial phases, or they can be drugs that the FDA has approved for other diseases but that can be repurposed to treat meningiomas and schwannomas. As these tumors are currently treated mostly by surgery or radiotherapy, the development of an effective drug for these tumors would be a valuable addition to the treatment regimen of these patients.