Medical Student Research Fellowship for Summer 2011

Mentor:                       John D. Minna, M.D.
Department:               Hamon Center for Therapeutic Oncology Research (Int Med/Pharm)
Room number:           NB8.206
Mail Code:                 8593
Phone number:          214 648-4900
E-mail:                        john.minna@utsouthwestern.edu
Project title:                “Genome wide shRNA library screens to find new therapeutic targets for lung cancer”

Human subjects IRB approved project number (where applicable):       Not applicable

Animal subjects IRB approved project number (where applicable):       APN 2009-0178

Project Type (patient-based research, animal-based research, or basic research; this characterization is only to permit a general classification for grouping similar types of projects)

Brief Description of Project:
Jenny will work with my graduate student Suzie Hight who has been working to develop the technology (in collaboration with Dr. Michael Green at the Univ. of Mass) to put whole genome shRNA libraries into normal cells or tumors and then growing these in immunodeprived mice (NOD/SCID mice) and then using NexGen sequencing (of bar coded shRNAs) to identify what has been selectively retained or eliminated in lung cancer cells or normal lung epithelial cells converted to tumorigenicity by the shRNA library.  Jenny will be working on the “dropout” screens to determine which shRNAs are “dropped out” of the lung cancer cells growing in vivo as xenografts.  These shRNAs would be knocking down genes that are vital to the in vivo growth of the lung cancer and thus the protein products of these genes would be new therapeutic targets for lung cancer.  Since this is a big project we want Jenny first to learn the appropriate techniques (tissue culture, shRNA handling and transfection, animal studies) and then take one or two of the sRNAs discovered in the bigger screen and study them in depth across a panel of lung cancer lines.  She can then correlate her data with our large legacy data sets of oncogenotypes and chemotherapy response phenotypes. This should give her enough potentially for a publication.

Previous Research Activities or Publications with Medical Students:

John Minna has a long history of mentoring medical students at UTSW.