Cholesterol metabolism-dependent control of tumour-associated macrophage function

卵巢癌是生存率最低的癌症之一，而且很难诊断和治疗。被称为巨噬细胞的免疫细胞可以对抗癌细胞，但相反，它们似乎有助于卵巢癌细胞在体内扩散。该项目旨在确定巨噬细胞促进肿瘤生长的机制之一，并探索可能的治疗方法来阻止这一机制。我们的实验室最近对巨噬细胞的胆固醇代谢如何控制其炎症功能有了新的见解。我们认为这与卵巢癌有关，因为参与胆固醇代谢的酶高表达的患者比低表达的患者更有可能死亡。该学生将使用尖端的癌症模型（3D类器官，小鼠移植）来测试巨噬细胞的胆固醇代谢如何影响卵巢癌的生长和扩散。该学生将在巨噬细胞生物学和癌症免疫学领域的基础发现科学家（Drummond, Caamano）和临床肿瘤学家（Leung）的共同指导下，开发一个临床相关的项目，使用从实验台到临床的方法，在致命癌症的发病机制方面取得新发现。

Ovarian cancer has one of the poorest survival rates and is difficult to diagnose and treat. Immune cells called macrophages can fight cancer cells, but instead they appear to help ovarian cancer cells spread around the body. This project aims to determine one of the mechanisms by which macrophages promote tumour growth, and explore possible treatments to block this. Our lab has developed recent new insights into how cholesterol metabolism of macrophages might control their inflammatory function. We think this is relevant for ovarian cancer because patients who have high expression of enzymes involved in cholesterol metabolism are more likely to die than patients with low expression. The student will use cutting-edge cancer models (3D organoids, mouse transplant) to test how cholesterol metabolism of macrophages affects the growth and spread of ovarian cancer. The student will be co-supervised by basic discovery scientists with expertise in macrophage biology and cancer immunology (Drummond, Caamano), as well as clinical oncologist (Leung) to develop a clinically-relevant project that uses a bench-to-bedside approach to make new discoveries in the pathogenesis of a deadly cancer.