Lab activities: Ongoing projects Publications Resources: NCBI UCSC Genome browser Related links: LPG |
email: leemax@mail.nih.gov
Human cancers are complex diseases that arise from both the genetic and epigenetic changes. Human genome sequence and rapid progresses in the high-throughput genome research and functional genomics have revolutionized the ways that we carry out our genetic research. Our major goal is to integrate genetics, genome, and bioinformatics to discover genes and epigenetic markers important for human cancers and to study their functions in the normal and cancer cells. We have applied high-throughput technogolies to identifying genes that present as plausible candidates for contributing to breast cancer development. The genomic investigation has led to the identification of two putative oncogenes, IRX2 and TBL1XR1. To date, our research has provided direct experimental evidence supporting an oncogenic effect for TBL1XR1. We used the shRNA approach to knock down the expression of TBL1XR1 in breast cancer cells and found that depletion of the TBL1XR1 protein in the cells reduced cell migration/invasion and suppressed tumor growth in mouse xenografts. Our epigenomic investigation has led to the identification of DNA methylation signatures that are selectively associated with clinical phenotypes such as lymph node involvement, histological grade, tumor size, and ER/PR/HER2 status. In addtion, we have also done extensive integrated analyses for Esophageal squamous cell carcinoma and gastric cancer.
Our collaborators include Drs. Lalage Wakefield, Kent Hunter, Kevin Gardner, Dinah Singer, Phil Taylor, Alisa Goldstein, Mark Sherman, Jonine Figueroa, etc.
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