Our last visiting lecture entitled ‘Characterizing and targeting chromatin-associated vulnerabilities in acute lymphoblastic leukemia‘ will be delivered by professor Prof. Panos Ntziachristos from Ghent University on 14th November 2023.
Acute lymphoblastic leukemia is a very prevalent cancer in kids and adults. About one-fourth of children and 50% of adults with acute leukemia develop resistance to therapy or relapse post therapy. Resistance mechanisms are poorly understood, and current research on oncogenesis mainly focuses on genetic alterations in relapsed disease.
Our studies focus on the epigenetic component of leukemia and reveal how transcription factors orchestrate their network to push leukemia growth. I will discuss how NOTCH1 and other transcriptional regulators compete with or recruit epigenetic modulators and how they rewire the chromatin architecture to activate their downstream targets. Finally, I will highlight efforts to target those components in preclinical settings of leukemia.