Seminar

Tissue microenvironment and cancer evolution within us

James DeGregori, PhD

Cancer is widely considered to result from the progressive accumulation of oncogenic mutations. Dr. James DeGregory will present evidence against this paradigm. Through theoretical, experimental and computational methods, he will provide support for an alternative theory for cancer causation: Adaptive Oncogenesis. This theory posits that changes in tissues in old age or with carcinogenic exposures promote selection for adaptive oncogenic mutations, which would not be selected for in a healthy tissue landscape. Dr. DeGregory is Professor at the University of Colorado at Anschutz Medical Campus. His lab seeks to understand how carcinogenic conditions promote cancer evolution and to discover pathway dependencies in cancers that can be exploited therapeutically. He has developed an evolutionary-based model for cancer development, Adaptive Oncogenesis. In this model, mutations (including oncogenic mutations) face fitness landscapes that vary with age or following carcinogen exposure. Using mouse models, his group is currently exploring how reduced progenitor cell fitness resulting from irradiation, inadequate diet, smoking or aging can select for adaptive oncogenic events and thereby promote the expansion and fixation of oncogenically initiated cells. Other studies in the lab are geared towards the development of novel therapeutic strategies to treat leukemias and non-small cell lung cancers.