2026 SNO/ASCO CNS Metastases Conference
August 13-15, 2026
Boston, Massachusetts
Lizza Hendriks, MD, PhD, Prof
Dr Hendriks is the representative for thoracic oncology in the Maastricht UMC Comprehensive Cancer Center and chairs the Innovative Cancer Diagnostics Therapy group at the School for Oncology and Developmental Biology (GROW) at Maastricht University, where she is also appointed as full professor. She is heavily involved in clinical and translational research and is (local) principal investigator in several phase II and III clinical trials, focusing on (locally) advanced NSCLC and SCLC, targeted treatments and immunotherapies. Her main research interests are brain metastases and oligometastases.
She is an active member of Dutch (NVALT, NRS), European (ESMO, EORTC, ETOP, ERS) and global societies (IASLC, ASCO), is chair of the NVALT studies foundation, vice-chair of the scientific committee of the Dutch Thoracic Group and secretary of the EORTC Lung Cancer Group.
Dr Hendriks was the lead author of the revised ESMO Clinical Practice Guidelines on metastatic NSCLC and author of the ESMO Clinical Practice Guideline on SCLC and non-metastatic NSCLC. She is member of the Dutch guideline committees on NSCLC, and former member for brain metastases and leptomeningeal metastases.
Benjamin Izar, MD, PhD
Dr. Benjamin Izar is the Vivian and Seymour Milstein Family Associate Professor at Columbia University Vagelos College of Physicians and Surgeons, Department of Medicine, Division of Hematology and Oncology and a member of the Tumor Biology and Microenvironment Program at the Herbert Irving Comprehensive Cancer Center.
Dr. Izar's clinical practice focuses on melanoma and cancer immunotherapy. In his lab, Dr. Izar studies interactions between cancer cells and cells of the tumor-microenvironment, and how these define metastatic niches, response and resistance to cancer immunotherapies. His lab develops and uses cutting-edge single-cell genomics and genome-editing tools to study patient tumors and models at unprecedented resolution. He is a physician-scientist with a particular focus on understanding metastasis to the brain and cancer immune evasion.
Dr. Izar received his MD/PhD at Justus Liebig University in Giessen, Germany, where he was graduated summa cum laude. He completed his internal medicine residency training at Massachusetts General Hospital and medical oncology training at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, followed by his first faculty position at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute. He completed post-doctoral research training in cancer immunology at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard.