Jeremy Purvis, PhD (Professor, Department of Genetics) has been awarded a new R01 grant for his project titled “Cell cycle paths as a framework for understanding drug resistance in tumor cell subpopulations” from the National Cancer Institute.
The goal of this project is to investigate variability in tumor cell cycle progression at the single-cell level and to apply this fundamental knowledge to understand how ER+/HER2- tumor cells resist palbociclib-induced cell cycle arrest. Overall, this project will build a molecular understanding of the heterogeneity in cell cycle behaviors that leads to fractional arrest in ER+/HER2- tumors, paving the way for the development of next-generation systems biomarkers that capture the unique cell cycle behaviors and drug sensitivities in other cancer types.