Alex

Alex:

Graduate Researcher

Lammerding Lab

Explain your research to someone as if you were describing it to someone who knows little about the scientific basis of the disease.

“When cancer cells are moving from the first organ that they are in to another during what’s called metastasis, they have to squeeze through a lot of really tight spaces. When they squeeze through these tight spaces, the nucleus is the largest organelle…and when they squeeze through these tight spaces the nucleus is actually bigger than the spaces they are trying to squeeze through. So we study how the nucleus deforms in order to squeeze through. I kind of like to think of it like spelunking or caving when you are squeezing through the caves that are really really narrow. And sometimes when [the cancer cells] are deforming they deform so substantially that end up rupturing. The nuclear envelope protects the nucleus and what’s inside of [the nucleus] like the DNA and important stuff. What can happen is that [the inside of the nucleus] can be exposed to the outside of the nucleus. Cytoplasmic proteins can go in to the nucleus and nuclear proteins can come out of the nucleus. We think this can play a role in the continued mutation of a cancer cell, as it is moving through the body. Why this is important is because most people die of metastasis and secondary diagnoses from cancer and not their primary one.”

Do you have a personal connection to your research?

“So my mom was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer when I was five. And so my whole life has sort of revolved around cancer because she was in a clinical trial and, if she survived for a certain amount of time, then she had to pay her clinical trial bills. And so, even though she didn’t have cancer when I got older, we had a lot of money, debt, due to the hospital and the doctors, right around when I was going to college. It was always a big part of my life.”