Cancer Genetics
Finding New Treatments for Cancer
Developing effective and specific drug treatments for cancer and related diseases is a major challenge. In MCCB, researchers utilize animal and cell disease models developed through their basic research endeavors as platforms for both chemical and genetic screens to identify new therapeutic compounds or targets. These efforts have led to the identification of new small molecules that have the potential to treat patients with a particular type of leukemia. Chemical screens have also been used to identify specific anti-fungal agents that may protect patients from common hospital pathogens. Unique whole organism-based chemical screens using zebrafish disease models are also ongoing. These efforts are supported by a Small Molecule Screening facility that provides access to chemical libraries, liquid handling and informatics resources, as well as a High-throughput Imaging facility located within MCCB. At the same time, MCCB labs are using both cell- and organism-based genetic screens to identify genes that are essential for cancer initiation or progression, or for related processes such as angiogenesis. In these efforts, MCCB researchers benefit from the RNAi Core facility, which is located within the department and provides genome-wide mouse and human RNAi or CRISPR libraries for cell-based screening.
Our PIs that are conducting research in the area of Cancer Genetics:
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