Robert L. Judson-Torres

Robert L. Judson-Torres, PhD

Languages spoken: English

Academic Information

Departments Primary - Dermatology , Adjunct - Oncological Sciences

Lab

Academic Bio: Dr. Robert Judson-Torres received his Ph.D. from the University of California, San Francisco in Biomedical Sciences in 2012 for his discovery and mechanistic dissection of microRNAs that mediate somatic cell reprogramming. He was subsequently awarded the NIH Director’s Early Independence Award. He initiated an independent research program as a Sandler Fellow in the UCSF Program for Breakthrough Biomedical Research.

From 2014-2019, Dr. Judson-Torres headed his research group at the UCSF Helen Diller Family Comprehensive Cancer Center. He pioneered the use of CRISPR/Cas9 engineering in primary human melanocytes as a model system for melanoma initiation and focused on identifying the transcriptional programs that precede tumorigenesis. In 2019, he joined the faculty of the Department of Dermatology and the Huntsman Cancer Institute of the University of Utah.

Research: Dr. Judson-Torres’ research program seeks to understand the dynamic transcriptional programs regulating human melanocytes and how disruptions to these programs permit or drive the early stages of melanoma development. Melanoma is a skin cancer that is curable if detected early, but frequently fatal if left unchecked. Melanomas are derived from melanocytes that have acquired specific genetic mutations. However, the majority of melanocytes that acquire these exact mutations do not progress to melanoma. Both the intrinsic transcriptional and epigenetic programs as well as the external environmental and chemical factors that govern the probability of transformation are poorly understood. His laboratory studies diverse populations of primary human melanocytes and melanoma cell lines using single cell sequencing, live quantitative phase imaging, and CRISPR/Cas9-based precision engineering. Translational aspects of his work include the identification of transcriptional programs as potential biomarkers for early melanoma diagnosis and the discovery of administered compounds that alter the probability of transformation.

Teaching: Dr. Judson-Torres serves as a mentor for students at many levels of education, from high school through post-doctoral and clinical fellows and residents. In addition to training students in molecular, cell and translational research, he is also particularly interested in career development for graduate students and post-doctoral fellows. Dr. Judson-Torres is an avid believer that well-trained scientists should be professionally serving our communities in all aspects of organization, government, planning and education, in addition to academic and industrial research.

Service: Dr. Judson-Torres has served as a member and instructor for multiple career development workshops and programs, and is a member of the University of Utah Academic Senate Special Committee focused on updating the policies, rights and benefits of post-doctoral scholars. He serves on the HCI cancer education committee where he helps to spearhead the Huntsman Cancer Institute Postdoc Showcase. He has organized multiple international symposia focused on expanding and standardizing practices in digital holographic cytometry. He serves on the council of the Pan-American Society for Pigment Cell Research where he chairs the Membership and Outreach committee.

Education History

Undergraduate Wesleyan University
 BA
Fellowship National Institutes of Health
 Postbaccalaureate Research Fellow
Doctoral Training University of California, San Francisco
 PhD
Fellowship University of California, San Francisco
 Fellow

Selected Publications

Journal Article

  1. Torres R, Judson-Torres R (2019). Research Techniques Made Simple: Feature Selection for Biomarker Discovery. The Journal of investigative dermatology, 139(10), 2068-2074.e1.
  2. Torres R, Lang UE, Hejna M, Shelton SJ, Joseph NM, Shain AH, Yeh I, Wei ML, Oldham MC, Bastian BC, Judson-Torres R (2020). MicroRNA Ratios Distinguish Melanomas from Nevi. The Journal of investigative dermatology, 140(1), 164-173.e7.
  3. Lang UE, Torres R, Cheung C, Vladar EK, McCalmont TH, Kim J, Judson-Torres R (2020). Ciliation Index Is a Useful Diagnostic Tool in Challenging Spitzoid Melanocytic Neoplasms. The Journal of investigative dermatology, 140(7), 1401-1409.e2.
  4. Melton C, Judson RL, Blelloch (2010). Opposing microRNA families regulate self-renewal in mouse embryonic stem cells. Nature, 463(7281), 621-6.
  5. Tang J, Fewings E, Chang D, Zeng H, Liu S, Jorapur A, Belote RL, McNeal AS, Tan TM, Yeh I, Arron ST, Judson-Torres RL, Bastian BC, Shain A (2020). The genomic landscapes of individual melanocytes from human skin. Nature, 586(7830), 600-605.
  6. Swarbrick A, Woods SL, Shaw A, Balakrishnan A, Phua Y, Nguyen A, Chanthery Y, Lim L, Ashton LJ, Judson RL, Huskey N, Blelloch R, Haber M, Norris MD, Lengyel P, Hackett CS, Preiss T, Chetcuti A, Sullivan CS, Marcusson EG, Weiss W, L'Etoile N, Goga (2010). miR-380-5p represses p53 to control cellular survival and is associated with poor outcome in MYCN-amplified neuroblastoma. Nature medicine, 16(10), 1134-40.
  7. Judson RL, Babiarz JE, Venere M, Blelloch (2009). Embryonic stem cell-specific microRNAs promote induced pluripotency. Nature biotechnology, 27(5), 459-61.
  8. Belote RL, Le D, Maynard A, Lang UE, Sinclair A, Lohman BK, Planells-Palop V, Baskin L, Tward AD, Darmanis S, Judson-Torres R (2021). Human melanocyte development and melanoma dedifferentiation at single-cell resolution. Nature cell biology, 23(9), 1035-1047.
  9. Zeng H, Jorapur A, Shain AH, Lang UE, Torres R, Zhang Y, McNeal AS, Botton T, Lin J, Donne M, Bastian IN, Yu R, North JP, Pincus L, Ruben BS, Joseph NM, Yeh I, Bastian BC, Judson R (2018). Bi-allelic Loss of CDKN2A Initiates Melanoma Invasion via BRN2 Activation. Cancer cell, 34(1), 56-68.e9.
  10. Shain AH, Joseph N, Yu R, Benhamida J, Ruben B, North J, Yeh I, Judson RL, Bastian B (2018). Genomic and transcriptomic analysis reveals incremental disruption of key signaling pathways during melanoma evolution. Cancer cell, 34(1), 45-55.
  11. Judson RL, Greve TS, Parchem RJ, Blelloch (2013). MicroRNA-based discovery of barriers to dedifferentiation of fibroblasts to pluripotent stem cells. Nature structural & molecular biology, 20(10), 1227-35.
  12. Lange D, Polanco E, Judson-Torres RL, Zangle T, Lex (2021). Loon: Using Exemplars to Visualize Large-Scale Microscopy Data. IEEE transactions on visualization and computer graphics,
  13. Hejna M, Jorapur A, Song JS, Judson R (2017). High accuracy label-free classification of single-cell kinetic states from holographic cytometry of human melanoma cells. Scientific reports, 7(1), 11943.
  14. McNeal AS, Belote RL, Zeng H, Urquijo M, Barker K, Torres R, Curtin M, Shain AH, Andtbacka RH, Holmen S, Lum DH, McCalmont TH, VanBrocklin MW, Grossman D, Wei ML, Lang UE, Judson-Torres R (2021). BRAFV600E induces reversible mitotic arrest in human melanocytes via microrna-mediated suppression of AURKB. eLife, 10,
  15. Moustafa TE, Polanco ER, Belote RL, Judson-Torres RL, Zangle T (2023). Fabrication and validation of an LED array microscope for multimodal, quantitative imaging. HardwareX, 13, e00399.
  16. Parkman GL, Turapov T, Kircher DA, Burnett WJ, Stehn CM, O'Toole K, Culver KM, Chadwick AT, Elmer RC, Flaherty R, Stanley KA, Foth M, Lum DH, Judson-Torres RL, Friend JE, VanBrocklin MW, McMahon M, Holmen S (2023). Genetic silencing of AKT induces melanoma cell death via mTOR suppression. Molecular cancer therapeutics, 23(3), 301-315.
  17. Scherzer MT, Deacon DC, Judson-Torres R (2023). Perilesional Epigenomes Distinguish Melanocytic Nevus Subtypes. The Journal of investigative dermatology, 143(9), 1631-1633.
  18. Smith EA, Belote RL, Cruz NM, Moustafa TE, Becker CA, Jiang A, Alizada S, Prokofyeva A, Chan TY, Seasor TA, Balatico M, Cortes-Sanchez E, Lum DH, Hyngstrom JR, Zeng H, Deacon DC, Grossmann AH, White RM, Zangle TA, Judson-Torres R (2024). Receptor tyrosine kinase inhibition leads to regression of acral melanoma by targeting the tumor microenvironment. Journal of experimental & clinical cancer research, 43(1), 317.
  19. Moustafa TE, Belote RL, Polanco ER, Judson-Torres RL, Zangle T (2024). Quadrant darkfield for label-free imaging of intracellular puncta. Journal of biomedical optics, 29(11), 116501.
  20. Basurto-Lozada P, Vázquez-Cruz ME, Molina-Aguilar C, Jiang A, Deacon DC, Cerrato-Izaguirre D, Simonin-Wilmer I, Arriaga-González FG, Contreras-Ramírez KL, Dawson ET, Wong-Ramirez JRC, Ramos-Galguera JI, Álvarez-Cano A, García-Ortega DY, García-Salinas OI, Hidalgo-Miranda A, Cisneros-Villanueva M, Martínez-Said H, Arends MJ, Ferreira I, Tullett M, Olvera-León R, van der Weyden L, Del Castillo Velasco Herrera M, Roldán-Marín R, Vidaurri de la Cruz H, Tavares-de-la-Paz LA, Hinojosa-Ugarte D, Belote RL, Bishop DT, Díaz-Gay M, Alexandrov LB, Sánchez-Pérez Y, In GK, White RM, Possik PA, Judson-Torres RL, Adams DJ, Robles-Espinoza C (2024). Ancestry and somatic profile predict acral melanoma origin and prognosis.
  21. Chhibber T, Scherzer MT, Prokofyeva A, Becker C, Zitnay RG, Smith E, Khurana N, Skliar M, Deacon DC, VanBrocklin MW, Ghandehari H, Judson-Torres RL, Jafari (2024). Transdermal Delivery of Ultradeformable Cationic Liposomes Complexed with miR211-5p (UCL-211) Stabilizes BRAFV600E+ Melanocytic Nevi. bioRxiv,
  22. Hu M, Coleman S, Judson-Torres RL, Tan A (2024). The classification of melanocytic gene signatures. Pigment cell & melanoma research, 37(6), 854-863.
  23. Deacon DC, Stubben C, Marcacci E, Stone CJ, Birdsall M, Florell SR, Boucher K, Grossman D, Judson-Torres R (2024). Classification of Cutaneous Melanoma and Melanocytic Nevi with MicroRNA Ratios Is Preserved in the Acral Melanoma Subtype. The Journal of investigative dermatology, 145(3), 707-709.e2.
  24. Ye J, Boileau RM, Parchem RJ, Judson-Torres RL, Blelloch (2024). The miR-290 and miR-302 clusters are essential for reprogramming of fibroblasts to induced pluripotent stem cells. bioRxiv,
  25. Moustafa TE, Belote RL, Polanco ER, Judson-Torres RL, Zangle T (2024). Quadrant darkfield (QDF) for label-free imaging of intracellular puncta. bioRxiv,
  26. Fastner S, Rahman H, Gutierrez J, Shen N, Florell SR, Florell A, Stubben CJ, Boucher KM, Deacon DC, Judson-Torres RL, Grossman (2024). MicroRNA Signatures Associated with Basal Cell Carcinoma Subtypes. JID innovations, 4(4), 100286.
  27. Smith EA, Belote RL, Cruz NM, Moustafa TE, Becker CA, Jiang A, Alizada S, Chan TY, Seasor TA, Balatico M, Cortes-Sanchez E, Lum DH, Hyngstrom JR, Zeng H, Deacon DC, Grossmann AH, White RM, Zangle TA, Judson-Torres R (2024). Receptor tyrosine kinase inhibition leads to regression of acral melanoma by targeting the tumor microenvironment. bioRxiv,
  28. Jiang R, Liang X, Tao Y, Xia R, Lei M, Jiang B, Judson-Torres RL, Zhang Y, Zhang W, Zeng (2022). Clinical utilization of olaparib, a PARP inhibitor, in BRCA1-mutant metastatic acral melanoma. Genes & diseases, 10(5), 1755-1758.
  29. Greiner D, Xue Q, Waddell TQ, Kurudza E, Chaudhary P, Belote RL, Dotti G, Judson-Torres RL, Reeves MQ, Cheshier SH, Roh-Johnson (2025). Human CSPG4-targeting CAR-macrophages inhibit melanoma growth. Oncogene, 44(22), 1665-1677.
  30. Chhibber T, Scherzer MT, Prokofyeva A, Becker C, Zitnay RG, Smith E, Khurana N, Skliar M, Deacon DC, VanBrocklin MW, Ghandehari H, Judson-Torres RL, Jafari (2025). Transdermal delivery of ultradeformable cationic liposomes complexed with miR211-5p (UCL-211) stabilizes BRAFV600E+ melanocytic nevi. Journal of controlled release, 381, 113586.
  31. Ye J, Boileau RM, Parchem RJ, Judson-Torres RL, Blelloch (2025). The miR-290 and miR-302 clusters are essential for reprogramming of fibroblasts to induced pluripotent stem cells. Stem cells (Dayton, Ohio), 43(2),
  32. Lee KJ, Kao YC, Jiang A, Prokofyeva A, Tom LN, Jagirdar K, Smit DJ, Oey HM, Tan JM, Ainger SA, Huang N, Tuong ZK, Andersen S, Senabouth A, Powell JE, Lambie D, Schaider H, Soyer HP, Sturm RA, Welm AL, Grossman D, Judson-Torres RL, Stark M (2025). Subclinical Fields of BRAF V600E-Mutant Melanocytes Populate Human Skin and Are Enriched Around Melanoma and Naevi. The British journal of dermatology,
  33. Jiang A, Huntsman A, Becker C, Feng BJ, Marks K, Donigan J, Duffy KL, Frigerio A, Grossman D, Neklason DW, Judson-Torres RL, Deacon D (2025). Assessing MC1R Variants in Lentigo Maligna Melanoma within the Utah Population. Cancer research communications, 5(7), 1228-1234.

Review

  1. Zeng H, Judson-Torres RL, Shain A (2020). The Evolution of Melanoma - Moving beyond Binary Models of Genetic Progression. The Journal of investigative dermatology, 140(2), 291-297.
  2. Greve TS, Judson RL, Blelloch (2013). microRNA control of mouse and human pluripotent stem cell behavior. Annual review of cell and developmental biology, 29, 213-239.
  3. Ma Y, Xia R, Ma X, Judson-Torres RL, Zeng (2021). Mucosal Melanoma: Pathological Evolution, Pathway Dependency and Targeted Therapy. Frontiers in oncology, 11, 702287.
  4. Deacon DC, Smith EA, Judson-Torres R (2021). Molecular Biomarkers for Melanoma Screening, Diagnosis and Prognosis: Current State and Future Prospects. Frontiers in medicine, 8, 642380.
  5. Masoudi M, Torabi P, Judson-Torres RL, Khodarahmi R, Moradi (2024). Natural resistance to cancer: A window of hope. International journal of cancer, 154(7), 1131-1142.
  6. Vand-Rajabpour F, Savage M, Belote RL, Judson-Torres R (2023). Critical Considerations for Investigating MicroRNAs during Tumorigenesis: A Case Study in Conceptual and Contextual Nuances of miR-211-5p in Melanoma. Epigenomes, 7(2),
  7. Chhibber T, Deacon DC, Ghandehari H, Judson-Torres R (2025). Recent advances in gene delivery for melanocyte-associated disorders. Advanced drug delivery reviews, 227, 115703.

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