Dr. Maria Elena Élez (MD, PhD) is a Medical Oncology Consultant at Vall d’Hebron University Hospital and Principal Investigator of the Colorectal Cancer and Precision Oncology Programme at the Vall d’Hebron Institute of Oncology (VHIO), Barcelona, Spain. A leading specialist in metastatic colorectal cancer (CRC), her research focuses on the RAS/BRAF pathway, particularly BRAF V600E-mutant CRC, liquid biopsy-based monitoring of ctDNA, and molecular classification of colorectal tumours. She led the BREAKWATER trial, whose results were published in the New England Journal of Medicine (ASCO 2025), and has published landmark studies in Nature Medicine and the NEJM. She is actively involved in European collaborative projects and has served in educational leadership roles at SEOM and VHIO.