Research Abstract

Women with mutations in hereditary cancer genes, BRCA1 and BRCA2, are highly predisposed to breast cancer (lifetime risk 50-80%), ovarian cancer (lifetime risk 15-40%), and men with mutations in BRCA2 are predisposed to pancreatic, and prostate cancer. How a normal, presumably healthy cell in these mutation carriers transforms into a tumor cell is largely unknown. The primary research interest of our laboratory is to understand 1) how and when normal, presumably healthy cells become tumor cells, and 2) how can we leverage these mechanistic insights to design better preventive and therapeutic treatment strategies. We are addressing these questions in the setting of hereditary breast and ovarian cancer by studying genes like BRCA1, BRCA2, PALB2, Rad51C and others.