Title: Professor in the Department of Molecular and Cellular Oncology
Institution: The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center
Research: Cancer is linked to almost every human DNA repair (DR) pathway. Yet, the effects of DNA damage depend on poorly understood DR complexes that are targets for treatments. Tainer seeks to define and test DR changes that will inform BRCA protein essentiality in cells and synthetic lethality in tumors, as well as strategies to control the abscopal effect (where ionizing radiation is immunosuppressive yet can activate an immune response to kill tumors distant from the radiation site). Results will produce data to combine measurements from molecules to cells, help design dissection-of-function mutations and inhibitor tools, and predict biological outcomes.
