James C. Yao
Medical oncologist at MD Anderson Cancer Center who led the RADIANT-3 and RADIANT-4 trials that made the mTOR inhibitor everolimus a standard treatment for advanced neuroendocrine tumours
Department of Gastrointestinal Medical Oncology, The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston (papers 2011–2026)
Neuroendocrine tumours grow from hormone-making cells, for example in the pancreas, gut or lung. They often grow slowly, but once they spread they are hard to treat, and in many of them the PI3K-AKT-mTOR pathway is switched on. James Yao was first author of RADIANT-3 (YAO2011), a phase 3 trial in the New England Journal of Medicine that randomly assigned 410 patients with advanced pancreatic neuroendocrine tumours to everolimus, an mTOR-blocking drug, or placebo. The time before the cancer grew again more than doubled, from a median of 4.6 months on placebo to 11.0 months on everolimus, and most side effects were mild. The result led to everolimus being approved for this cancer.
Yao then led RADIANT-4, published in the Lancet in 2016, which tested everolimus in 302 patients with non-functional neuroendocrine tumours of the lung or gastrointestinal tract. Median progression-free survival was 11.0 months with everolimus and 3.9 months with placebo. Together the two trials showed that blocking mTOR helps across neuroendocrine tumours from several organs, which is strong evidence from people that mTOR signalling drives these cancers.
PubMed lists Yao at The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center throughout this work and, in 2026, in its Department of Gastrointestinal Medical Oncology, with more than 120 papers on neuroendocrine tumours.
Milestones in the Atlas
A selection, not a full bibliography: only papers that meet the Atlas inclusion criteria.
| Year | Evidence | Study |
|---|---|---|
| 2011 | H | Everolimus for advanced pancreatic neuroendocrine tumors (RADIANT-3) YAO2011 First author of the RADIANT-3 trial showing that everolimus more than doubles progression-free survival in advanced pancreatic neuroendocrine tumours. |
Co-authors in the Atlas 3
People with a profile here who share at least one study with James C. Yao.
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- David Lebwohl Medical oncologist and drug developer who led the clinical development of everolimus (Afinitor) at Novartis through approvals in several cancers and tuberous sclerosis, and later served as Chief Medical Officer of the gene-editing company Intellia Therapeutics
- Jaume Capdevila Medical oncologist specialising in neuroendocrine and endocrine tumours
- Kjell Öberg A leading figure in neuroendocrine tumor research and care, and a co-author of the RADIANT-3 trial that supported everolimus for pancreatic neuroendocrine tumors.
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