Val Brunton
Signalling and the regulation of cancer growth and metastasis
Research in a Nutshell
Tumour cells metastasise via a series of discrete biological processes that allow cells to disseminate from the primary tumour, move and colonise distant sites within the body. Our research focuses on understanding the molecular mechanisms whereby tumour cells can metastasise and in particular how adhesion networks drive metastatic spread. More recently we have also become interested in how these same adhesion pathways regulate drug resistance.
We use a range of protein/peptide technologies, genetic intervention and high-definition biological analysis including mouse models of cancer and quantitative intra-vital imaging that permits visualisation of multiple cancer cell phenotypes in vivo. This provides information on the molecular regulators of cancer processes linked to invasion, metastasis and survival in the tumour environment and allows us to monitor drug efficacy and mechanism of action of new molecularly targeted agents to enable identification of more effective treatments.
People |
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| Val Brunton |
Principal Investigator and Professor of Cancer Therapeutics |
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Ifigenia Stavrou |
PhD student/Research Assistant (with Margaret Frame) |
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Laura Gomez-Cuadrado |
PhD Student |
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Will Tipping |
PhD student/Research Assistant (with Alison Hulme) |
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Natasha Tracey |
PhD Student |
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Hila Emmert |
Post-doctoral Scientist |
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Morwenna Muir |
Research Assistant |
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Jun Li |
Research Assistant (with Margaret Frame) |
| Hitesh Patel | Post Doctoral Scientist (with Neil Carragher and Margaret Frame) |
| Kristel Sepp | PhD student (with Alison Hulme) |
| Ms Anastasia Kapara | PhD student (With Karen Faulds, University of Strathclyde) |
Contact
Scientific Themes
Metastasis, drug resistance, adhesion signalling
Technology Expertise
Mouse models of cancer, multimodal fluorescence and Raman imaging, cell biology