Eric K. Nakakura, MD, PhD

Board of Directors

NET Symposium Program Committee Past Chair

Surgical Oncology, University of California San Francisco

Dr. Nakakura received his medical degree at Stanford Medical School then went to Johns Hopkins to complete a residency in general surgery and a fellowship in surgical oncology. He was a specialist registrar in surgery at the John Radcliffe Hospital in Oxford, England. At Johns Hopkins, he received a doctoral degree in cellular and molecular medicine, identifying a novel transcription factor critical for neuroendocrine differentiation in normal development and cancer.

Dr. Nakakura’s research activity has primarily focused on neuroendocrine tumors (NETs), including basic, translational, and clinical studies. His laboratory has established a patient-derived xenograft model from a pancreatic NET. Using this unique model, Dr. Nakakura's laboratory is actively evaluating mechanisms of resistance to everolimus and collaborating with others to discover new drugs to overcome resistance to everolimus. Dr. Nakakura has also assembled a large bank of sporadic, multifocal ileum NETs and is working with others to understand their genetic and epigenetic underpinnings.

At UCSF, Dr. Nakakura’s surgical practice is focused on NETS, in particular, small intestine NETs, pancreatic/peripancreatic NETs, and NET liver metastases. He manages a high volume of NET patients with the NET multidisciplinary group at UCSF and specializes in the complex management decisions and the operations required.