The Role of CT-Antigen FATE in Apoptosis (2014)
Undergraduate: Daniela Mytsa
Faculty Advisor: Angelique Whitehurst
Department: Biology
The Whitehurst lab utilizes a pan-genomic loss of function screening platform to identify novel genetic targets within malignancies that can be leveraged for potential clinical benefit. Through use of this platform the Whitehurst lab has previously identified a group of aberrantly expressed gametogneic genes that contribute to tumor cell viability and proliferation. These genes belong to a larger cohort referred to as Cancer-Testis Antigens (CTAs) that consists of genes whose expression is normally restricted to the testes and other gametogenic tissues, but that are also frequently expressed in tumors from a variety of cancer lineages. My work focuses on one member of this group FATE1 (Fetal and Adult Testes Expressed 1). Previous work has shown that FATE1 is necessary to maintain cell viability in H1155, a non-small cell lung cancer-derived cell line but is non-essential in immortalized human bronchial epithelial cells indicating a large potential therapeutic window. Preliminary work in the lab has demonstrated that FATE1 has an anti-apoptotic effect within malignant cells. Through the use of siRNA-mediated gene depletion I have shown that depletion of FATE1 leads to the induction of apoptosis and a long-term loss of cell viability in a number of cancer backgrounds. Future studies will investigate the role this interaction plays in the functional requirement of FATE1 within tumors and if this dependency is recapitulated in vivo using xenograft mouse models.