Never miss a story
Sign up to get notified when new episodes of Women I Want You to Know are released.
All Episodes › Episode 01
What does it really take to move cancer research forward and who makes those breakthroughs possible?
In this episode of Women I Want You to Know by Andrea L. Johnston™ Podcast, Andrea sits down with Yung Lie, PhD, President and CEO of the Damon Runyon Cancer Research Foundation, to explore the people, funding, and courage behind some of the most important advances in cancer treatment today.
Yung’s path to leading one of the most respected cancer research foundations in the world began outdoors in the Midwest, driven by curiosity, science, and a deep love of discovery. Her career reflects what happens when women are given the freedom to follow bold ideas.
But this conversation goes far beyond a career timeline.
In this episode Yung shares:
- Why young scientists are essential to the future of cancer breakthroughs and why they’re at risk of being lost
- How Damon Runyon-funded researchers helped pioneer chemotherapy, targeted therapies, and immunotherapy
- What most people don’t understand about cancer as a disease and why “one cancer” doesn’t exist
- How funding gaps and proposed NIH cuts could derail decades of progress
- The growing role of AI, data science, and machine learning in accelerating diagnosis and treatment
- Why community is where scientific breakthroughs are born
Yung also opens up about her most personal chapter: caring for her husband through an aggressive, rare cancer diagnosis and how that experience reshaped her leadership, urgency, and commitment to patients and families navigating impossible choices.
This is a conversation about science, but also about humanity, courage, advocacy, and what it truly means to invest in the future.
Listen now and learn why the breakthroughs of tomorrow depend on the decisions we make today.
Connect with Yung Lie, Ph.D.:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/yunglie
https://www.linkedin.com/company/damonrunyon
https://www.instagram.com/damon_runyon/#
https://www.youtube.com/user/DamonRunyonFnd/videos
Yung S. Lie, PhD, is the President and Chief Executive Officer of the Damon Runyon Cancer Research Foundation, a non-profit organisation that provides today’s best young scientists with funding to pursue innovative cancer research. She joined the Foundation in 2008 as Scientific Director, was promoted to Deputy Director and Chief Scientific Officer in 2014, and began her current role in December 2018. Her goals are to foster new generations of scientists, enabling them to explore novel ideas and take risks, and to fill the gaps in traditional research funding that threaten future breakthroughs.
Yung received her BA in Molecular and Cellular Biology from the University of California at Berkeley and earned her PhD in Biological Sciences from Stanford University. Following graduate school, she worked as a bioinformatics consultant at Celera/Applied Biosystems, contributing to the Human Genome Project. She completed postdoctoral research in neuroscience as a Damon Runyon Fellow at the University of California at San Francisco and at The Rockefeller University.
