Dr. Velculescu is internationally known for his discoveries in genomics and cancer research. He and his colleagues performed the first genome-wide sequence analysis in human cancers, identifying key genes and pathways dysregulated in tumorigenesis. He developed methods for global gene expression analyses and coined the word “transcriptome" to describe the patterns that could now obtained in cancer and other cells. This research has revealed the genomic landscape of human cancers, including in breast, colorectal, brain, pancreatic, ovarian, head and neck, and lung cancers. These analyses identified a variety of genes not previously known to be involved in neoplasia, including PIK3CA as one of the most highly mutated genes in human cancer. More recently, his group has developed non-invasive liquid biopsies approaches for early detection and monitoring of cancer patients. These discoveries provide new paradigms for our understanding of human cancer, and have created opportunities for precision diagnostics and personalized medicine for oncology and other diseases.