UVA’s Center for Systems Analysis of Stress-adapted Cancer Organelles (SASCO) recently hosted its first annual symposium, sharing updates on major projects and work to improve research inclusivity as the program enters its third year.
Founded and co-led by Kevin Janes, Ph.D., the John Marshall Money Professor of Biomedical Engineering, and Matthew J. Lazzara, Ph.D., professor of chemical and biomedical engineering, SASCO is funded through a $12 million National Cancer Institute (NCI) U54 grant to research functional sub-cellular compartments in cancer. Its ultimate goal: to improve fundamental understanding of the inner workings of cancer cells to pave the way for more effective therapies.
The July 23 symposium drew about 100 live and virtual participants, including UVA faculty, students and staff, as well as guests from the NCI, various U.S. universities and the National University of Singapore.
SASCO’s Latest Discoveries in Tumor Biology and Therapy Development
Keynote speaker Donita Brady, Ph.D., associate professor of cancer biology and assistant dean for inclusion, diversity and equity in research at the University of Pennsylvania’s Perelman School of Medicine, presented on “Harnessing Chemical Interactions to Explore Tumor Cell Biological Responses to Fluctuations in Metal and Micronutrient Availability.” Brady discovered that kinase enzymes require copper to function, raising the possibility of targeting tumor growth by altering copper import.
Janes shared an update on SASCO’s first two years, which saw three publications and five preprints, with program participation by 20 faculty, seven staff and 28 trainees. Faculty and students presented updates on SASCO’s three primary research projects, each focused on the role of different organelles in a specific type of cancer: the spindle assembly checkpoint in breast cancer; mitochondrial fragmentation colorectal cancer; and membrane stress in glioblastoma. Presentations were introduced by project co-leads P. Todd Stukenberg, Ph.D., professor of biochemistry and molecular genetics, David Kashatus, Ph.D., associate professor of microbiology, immunology, and cancer Biology, and B.J. Purow, M.D., professor of neurology, respectively.
Key SASCO research findings to date include hidden genetic and pharmacologic susceptibilities in chromosome segregation, new models of cancer cell metabolism, and a form of “cell death by drinking” tied to a brain cancer gene.
SASCO’s Commitment to Inclusive Cancer Studies
Associate professor of biomedical engineering and genome sciences Kristen Naegle, Ph.D., and SASCO center co-lead, presented on SASCO’s prioritization of inclusiveness in cell lines, tissues and sample data in computational research models, noting dramatic overrepresentation of white patients in available tissue samples, cell models and clinical data. To improve research outcomes for impacting all patients, SASCO is building awareness within the program, explicitly requesting that project aims include the populations burdened by the cancers they are studying and align their models to capture the diversity of that population.
SASCO's ‘Hot Ones’ Panel Heats Up the Symposium
The day continued with lighting talks and a poster session, followed by a career panel inspired by the celebrity talk show “Hot Ones.” Brave panelists, who included Brady and Lecia Robinson, Ph.D., assistant professor of Biology at Tuskegee University and a visiting faculty member with the Cancer Center’s Short-Term Research Initiative for Visiting Educators (STRIVE) program, took ten-minute turns fielding questions, each accompanied by a taste of progressively hotter salsa. Four interviews took place, and the questions were designed and asked by members of SASCO from broadly different career stages.
Janes said SASCO considers the inaugural symposium a success and hopes to convene an even larger group of researchers in 2025. In the meantime, the team looks forward to advancing their computer models and cell-culture experiments into real tumor settings and patient-derived material.