Solving Molecular Mysteries Underlying Cancer Genetics and Bacterial Evolution

Ovarian cancer is complicated. This is because there are 5 types of ovarian cancer, each with their own unique characteristics and in how serious they are for the patient. In order to study ovarian cancer in the lab we use cancer cells taken from ovarian cancer tumours and we don’t know which of the 5 types of ovarian cancer they came from originally. It’s very important that the cells scientists use match the type of ovarian cancer they are studying. This is where I come in. For my project, I was able to match cancer cells used by scientists to one of the five types of ovarian cancer using DNA data- in particular DNA changes (or mutations) and which parts of the DNA are switched on or off (or gene expression).

Our gut is inhabited by an impressive diversity of bacteria. Viruses that attack these bacteria are usually bad news for them. But that is not always the case. Occasionally, a virus is instead ‘tricked’ into spreading bacterial genes, to great benefit of the bacterial population. With great diversity and vast number of bacterial viruses in the human gut, this gene sharing can impact the evolution of gut bacteria in a spectacular way. In this talk I will share some highlights of what we know about this kind of gene transfer and how we study it.

John, will discuss his current research focusing on how microbes in the gut recover after antibiotics , how microbes in your lung exacerbate asthma and how immunity can be affected by hormones.