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Cancer researchers
A number of faculty experts from the
University of Georgia are available to discuss a wide
range of issues related to cancer research– from
cellular division to drug development to cancer-related
communication. Following is a list of UGA experts available
for commentary. Media should feel free to call them
directly.
| COLLEGE
of ARTS & SCIENCES |
J. Michael Pierce
Professor, Biochemistry and Molecular Biology
Complex Carbohydrate Research Center
706/542-1702; hawkeye@uga.edu
Pierce’s research program focuses mainly on the
function of complex carbohydrates – oligosaccharides,
glycosyltransferases and lectins - in human health, with
emphasis on cancer progression and diagnosis. He is currently
involved in formation of a UGA cancer center.
David Puett
Regents Professor and Head, Biochemistry and Molecular
Biology
706/542-1676; puett@bmb.uga.edu
Puett’s research uses molecular, cell and whole
animal studies to investigate the connections between
the G protein-coupled receptors of reproductive hormones
and cancer.
Walter Schmidt
Assistant Professor, Biochemistry and Molecular
Biology
Georgia Cancer Coalition
Distinguished Cancer Scientist
706/542-1334; wschmidt@bmb.uga.eduwschmidt@bmb.uga.edu
Schmidt’s research utilizes biochemistry, cell biology,
proteomics and yeast genetics to better understand the
function of proteases that act on prenylated proteins.
Discoveries here may lead to novel therapeutic strategies
for cancer and other diseases.
Scott Dougan
Assistant
Professor, Cellular Biology
Georgia Cancer Coalition Distinguished Cancer Scientist
706/583-8194; dougan@cb.uga.edu
Dougan studies vertebrate development, focusing on the
mechanisms underlying the induction and patterning of
germ layers and the coordinated interaction cells from
these distinct germ layers use to form function organs,
the disruption of which can lead to diseases such as cancer.
Lance Wells
Assistant Professor, Biochemistry and Molecular
Biology
Complex Carbohydrate Research Center
706/542-7806; lwells@ccrc.uga.edu
Well’s laboratory studies "nutrient sensing"
or how post-translational modifications modulate the properties
of proteins in mammalian cell culture and animal tissues.
His research seeks to elucidate novel therapeutic targets
in disease states such as type II diabetes and cancer.
Michael Tiemeyer
Associate Professor, Biochemistry and Molecular
Biology
Complex Carbohydrate Research Center
706/542-2740; mtiemeyer@ccrc.uga.edu
Tiemeyer’s research group studies the influence
of cell surface carbohydrates on nervous system development
and the mechanisms that control oligosaccharide expression
in various tissues and during development. His research
findings may lead to ways to regenerate of nerves, increase
understanding of innate immunity, and uncover ways to
prevent tumor cells from spreading.
Ying Xu
Professor
and Regents-GRA Eminent Scholar, Biochemistry and Molecular
Biology
Georgia Cancer Coalition Distinguished Cancer Scientist
706/542-4453; xyn@bmb.uga.edu
Xu is involved in research and development work in various
areas of bioinformatics and computational biology, ranging
from computational genomics, proteomics to computational
systems biology uses bioinformatics and computational
biology.
Debra
Mohnen
Associate Professor, Biochemistry
and Molecular Biology
Complex Carbohydrate Research Center
706/542-4458; dmohnen@ccrc.uga.edu
Mohnen is investigating the beneficial effects of pectin
on human health, particularly in the development of pectin-based
effective neutraceutical and pharmaceutical strategies
to combat the incidence and lethality of prostate cancer.
Claiborne Glover
Professor, Biochemistry
and Molecular Biology and Genetics
706/542-1769; glover@uga.edu
Glover’s research focuses on protein phosphorylation
as a regulatory mechanism in eukaryotic cells, more specifically
casein kinase II (CKII), observations of which suggest
a role for the enzyme in human cancer.
Edward Kipreos
Assistant Professor, Cellular Biology
706/542-3862; ekipreos@cb.uga.edu
His research focuses on understanding cell cycle regulation
in multicellular eukaryotes and basic biomedical research
questions involving cancer.
Kelley
Moremen
Professor, Biochemistry and
Molecular Biology
706/542-1705; moremen@uga.edu
Moremen’s research focuses on the structure, regulation
and localization involved in the biosynthesis, recognition
and catabolism of mammalian glycoprotiens.
Michael Terns
Associate
Professor, Biochemistry and Molecular Biology; Adjunct
Professor, Genetics
706/542-1896; mterns@bmb.uga.edu
Tern’s laboratory studies the metabolism, transport,
and function of cellular RNAs, and applying our knowledge
to the design of RNA-based gene therapy agents that, for
example, can be used in the treatment of cancer.
Haini Cai
Assistant
Professor, Cellular Biology
706/542-3329; hcai@uga.edu
Cai studies the role of complex enhancers in transcriptional
regulation which underlies crucial aspects of development,
physiological responses, and many human diseases including
cancer.
Michael
McEachern
Assistant Professor, Genetics
706/542-4194; mjm@uga.edu
McEachern’s laboratory studies telomeres, the ends
of chromosomes, utilizing yeasts as model systems. The
functioning of telomere and telmerae, the enzyme that
can maintain telomeres, have been tied to human carcinogenesis.
Brian Cummings
Assistant professor, Pharmaceutical and Biomedical
Sciences
Georgia Cancer Coalition Distinguished Cancer Scientist
706/542-3792; bsc@rx.uga.edu
He studies the roles that lipid signals play in cancer
cell growth and proliferation and chemotherapeutic-induced
cell death in a variety of cancers; including brain, lung,
breast, kidney and prostate>cancer. He is especially
interested in the function that a membrane-bound protein
called Group VIB Phospholipase A2 during cancer cell growth.
William Spruill
Associate Professor, Clinical and Administrative
Pharmacy
703/542-5372; bspruill@mail.rx.uga.edubspruill@mail.rx.uga.edu
William Wade
Professor and Assoc. Department Head, Clinical
and Administrative Pharmacy
706/542-5316; bwade@mail.rx.uga.edu
Robert Galen
Clinical Professor, Clinical and Administrative
Pharmacy
This group is conducting a project to train and certify
community pharmacists to identify and educate their high
-risk patients on the warning signs and early detection
procedures for eight common cancers.
Note: Dr. Galen also is working with David Puett and Michael
Pierce on tumor markers.
| COLLEGE
of VETERINARY MEDICINE |
Karen Cornell
Assistant Professor, Small Animal Medicine
706/542-6379; kcornell@vet.uga.edukcornell@vet.uga.edu
Cornell’s research focuses on developing animal
models, particularly canine models, of human neoplastic
disease processes, such as primary tumor growth and metastic
spread.
Bruce LeRoy
Assistant Professor, Veterinary Pathology
706/542-5847; bleroy@vet.uga.edu
LeRoy’s laboratory is interested in further characterizing
prostate cancer in dogs as a model for studying human
prostate cancer.
Massimo Palmarini
Assistant Professor, Medical Microbiology and
Parasitology
Georgia Cancer Coalition Distinguished Cancer
Scientist
706/542-4784; mpalmari@vet.uga.edu
Palmarini’s laboratory studies of the mechanisms
of carcinogenesis in ovine pulmonary adenocarcinoma (OPA),
a retro-virus induced lung cancer found in sheep and one
strikingly similar to human lung adenocarcinoma.
Nicole Northrup
Assistant Professor, Small Animal Medicine
706/542-9384; Northrop@vet.uga.edu
Northrup researches issues related to cancer in dogs and
cats, including molecular characterization of feline injection
site sarcomas and evaluation of survivin expression and
prognosis in canine lymphoma.
Royce Roberts
Department Head, Anatomy and Radiology
706/542-8309; rroberts@vet.uga.edu
G. Heather Wilson
Assistant Professor, Small Animal Medicine
706/542-6328; hwilson@vet.uga.edu
Roberts and Wilson are doing studies to determine the
tolerance doses for radiation of normal tissues in pet
birds.
COLLEGE
of AGRICULTURE
& ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES |
Stephen Dalton
GRA Eminent Scholar, Molecular Cell Biology
Georgia Cancer Coalition Distinguished Cancer Scientist
706/542-9857; sdalton@uga.edu
His research focuses on aspects of cellular biology involved
in normal and abnormal embryonic cell development and
disease such as cancer.
Researchers interested in Cancer Communication:
Laura McCormick
Associate Professor
Human Health and Promotion, College of Education
706/542-4372; lmccormi@coe.uga.edu
(smoking prevention programs)
Don Rubin
Professor
Speech Communication, College of Arts & Sciences
706/542-3245; drubin@uga.edu
Vicki Freimuth
Professor
Grady College of Journalism & Mass Comm.; Speech Comm.,
College of Arts & Sciences
706/542-0586; Freimuth@uga.edu
Dean Krugman
Professor and Associate Dean
Grady College of Journalism and Mass Communication
706/542-479; dkrugman@uga.edu
Jeffrey Springston
Associate Professor
Grady College of Journalism and Mass Communication
706-542-5009; jspring@uga.edu
Celeste Condit
Research Professor
Speech Communication, College of Arts & Sciences
706/542-3262; ccondit@uga.edu
The following are among those UGA researchers
who have received research funding from the American Cancer
Society.
Michael W. W. Adams
Research Professor, Biochemistry and Molecular
Biology
706/542-2060; adams@bmb.uga.edu
Dr. Adams’s research team is conducting fundamental
studies to understand the relationship between the structure
and function of proteins. Changes in the functions of
proteins are involved in many diseases, including cancer.
In the ACS-funded research, they studied how specific
changes in protein structure altered the stability of
a model protein. Based in part on those results, funding
was subsequently obtained from various federal agencies,
including the National Institutes of Health, to considerably
expand these studies of protein structure-function relationships.
Jacek Gaertig
Associate Professor, Cellular Biology
706/542-3409; jgaertig@cb.uga.edu
Dr. Gaertig’s group uses the common pond protist
Tetrahymena thermophila as a model organism to study certain
enzymes involved in the assembly of cilia, small projections
that move at high speed on the cell surface. These studies
contribute to an understanding of cell differentiation
and formation of specialized cellular components. Many
types of tumors, including lung cancer, originate from
ciliated tissues.
Claiborne V. Glover
Professor, Biochemistry and Molecular Biology
706/542-1769; glover@uga.edu
A major goal of Dr. Glover’s laboratory is to understand
the physiological role and mechanism of regulation of
casein kinase II (CKII), a highly conserved protein kinase
that functions as an oncoprotein in mammals. ACS funding
of this work enabled his group to isolate the genes encoding
each of the enzyme’s subunits, to construct mutations
in these genes in order to analyze the function of the
enzyme in vivo, and to identify suppressors that begin
to define a CKII pathway. ACS funding also has enabled
Dr. Glover’s group to obtain an NIH grant to continue
this line of research.
Jaroslava Halper
Associate Professor, Veterinary Pathology
706/542-5830; jhalper@vet.uga.edu
Funding from the American Cancer Society led to purification and characterization of transforming
growth factor type (TGFe). Dr. Halper’s group
established that TGFe is a member of the granulin family
of peptides. These peptides are involved in proliferation
of epithelial and other types of cells, tumorigenesis
and embryonal development, to name just a few functions.
They showed that TGFe is an important mediator of tissue
repair where it acts as a mitogen for epithelial cells
and fibroblasts, and as a chemotactic agent for inflammatory
cells such as neutrophils and macrophages. Based on
these results the research team obtained an NIH grant
to study the role of TGFe in pathogenesis of pituitary
adenomas (benign epithelial tumors of the pituitary).
The team also had a longstanding collaboration with
Dr. Andrew Bateman from McGill University on expression
and biological role of granulins.
Edward T. Kipreos
Associate Professor, Cellular Biology
706/542-3862; ekipreos@cb.uga.edu
Cancer is caused by unregulated cell proliferation. Dr.
Kipreos’s lab studies how the process of cell division
is regulated using the roundworm Caenorhabditis elegans
as a model system to take advantage of its powerful genetic
approaches. In humans, the CUL-2 protein interacts with
the VHL tumor suppressor protein to protect cells from
cancer. They have discovered that in C. elegans the CUL-2
protein promotes multiple aspects of cell cycle progression
by degrading cell cycle regulators. This ACS funded project
allows the scientists to identify both the proteins with
which CUL-2 interacts and the proteins that are degraded
by CUL-2. The regulation of the cell cycle is largely
conserved in all animals, and therefore these results
should provide insights into the control of cell proliferation
in humans.
Michael J. McEachern
Assistant Professor, Genetics
706/542-4134; mjm@uga.edu
Dr. McEachern’s ACS grant was very important as
a transitional source of funding for research that was
later funded by an NIH grant. His research focuses on
telomeres, which are on the ends of chromosomes and have
crucial links to human cancer formation. Gradual telomere
erosion underlies the limited proliferative capacity of
normal human somatic cells and telomere maintenance pathways
are therefore crucial to the cellular immortalization
that accompanies cancer formation. This project involved
using yeast as a model organism to study various aspects
of telomere maintenance.
Rebecca McNeill Mullis
Professor and Department Head, Foods and Nutrition
706/542-1171; rmm@fcs.uga.edu
Dr. Rebecca Mullis and Ms. Kim Gibson have received ACS
support for a nutrition education program called Body
and Soul. The program is designed to decrease cancer risk
by increasing fruit and vegetable consumption. Aimed at
African-American audiences, the program is presented in
cooperation with faith-based organizations. Recommendations
based on pilot program evaluations will be used to modify
the program before it is implemented in churches nationwide.
Robert S. Phillips
Professor, Chemistry
706/542-1996; rsphillips@chem.uga.edu
Dr. Phillips studied the synthesis of novel
fluorine-containing amino acids that were thought to have
possible activity against melanoma. The concept was that
the tyrosinase enzyme, which is elevated in melanoma cells,
would convert the nontoxic form into a toxic form and
thus selectively kill the cells. Dr. Phillips and his
team demonstrated the concept in vitro, but the target
molecule unfortunately did not undergo the predicted enzymatic
conversion. Funding for basic studies related to this
project has been continued by a grant from NIH.
J. Michael Pierce
Professor, Biochemistry and Molecular Biology
Complex Carbohydrate Research Center
706/542-1702; hawkeye@uga.edu
Dr. Pierce’s research focuses on how complex carbohydrates
on the cell surface change during the process of cancer
development and progression. His laboratory identified
some of the most significant changes and their cause,
and is now exploiting this information to develop blood
markers for cancer diagnostics and potential inhibitors
of tumor progression. Dr. Pierce has received three research
awards from the National Cancer Institute to fund this
research. In addition, he is involved in a start-up biotechnology
company, Oncose, Inc., founded in Athens to develop cancer
diagnostics using technology developed in his UGA laboratory.
Michael
Terns
Associate Professor, Biochemistry and Molecular
Biology; Adjunct Professor, Genetics
706/542-1896; mterns@bmb.uga.edu
With the generous support of the American Cancer Society,
Dr. Terns and his lab are studying an enzyme called telomerase,
which plays a crucial role in the development of all major
cancer types. Telomerase is inactive in most normal adult
cells but is active in human cancers, making the enzyme
an attractive target for anti-cancer therapy. The main
goals of his research are to understand how telomerase
function is regulated and to develop inhibitors of telomerase
as novel anti-cancer agents.
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