OUR Research Projects
uncovering the Biology of paediatric malignancies arising from the neuroectoderm
Cancer is one of the main leading causes of death in children and adults. Paediatric cancers arise during development when tissues are growing. In contrast, cancer in adults develops from tissues that have reached their final size. Additionally, paediatric cancer responds differently to cancer therapy and is more lethal compared to cancer in adults. However, the reasons accounting for these differences are not fully understood.
PAEDIATRIC MELANOMA
Melanoma is the most common and deadly skin cancer in children and adolescents. However, the biology of paediatric melanoma remains elusive. In our lab, we aim at generating novel models of paediatric melanoma by combining genetic mouse models, grafting experiments and in vitro cultures. Models that we will use to uncover the biology of those yet unknown paediatric malignancies and to develop new treatments from young patients suffering from this deadly skin cancer.
MEDULLOBLASTOMA
Medulloblastomas are one of the most common paediatric brain tumours. In our lab, we focus on generating novel models of medulloblastoma and also use the already developed models to uncover the cellular and molecular drivers of medulloblastoma progression and therapy resistance.
NEUROBLASTOMA
Neuroblastomas (NBs) are among the most common solid tumours and a leading cause of paediatric death. They are composed of different tumour and tumour microenvironment cell populations, and present cellular heterogeneity. Cellular heterogeneity has been proposed to be responsible for tumour progression and therapy resistance.
We are interested to identify the cell populations that mediate tumour progression in those tumours. In addition, we aim at uncovering how these cell populations dynamically evolve during therapy and infer which populations resist the therapy, potentially leading to tumour relapse. To this end, we combine state-of-the art genetic mouse models, grafting experiments and in vitro cultures.
uncovering the mechanisms that drive Basal cell Carcinoma Formation
Basal Cell Carcinoma is the most common human cancer, it is a skin cancer that arises upon constitutive activation of the Hedgehog signalling pathway in skin keratinocytes.
In the lab we are interested in uncovering the cancer cell intrinsic and extrinsic factors that drive Basal Cell Carcinoma formation.
We have recently identified Survivin/Birc5 as a novel key driver of Basal Cell Carcinoma formation. Survivin is required in the skin stem cells to evolve into a Basal Cell Carcinoma upon oncogenic activation. Specifically, we showed that Survivin mediates competence to Basal Cell Carcinoma formation by promoting proliferation while preventing cell differentiation and apoptosis (Canato et al, Cancer Discovery, 2025)
We are currently exploring the contribution of the mechanical forces to Basal Cell Carcinoma initiation (Sahu et al, preprint, biorxiv, 2024).