Cartolano Lab

Our research focus:

The study of somatic alterations in cancer is pivotal to understand how tumors originate, progress and become resistant to therapy. Somatic mutations account for the genetic heterogeneity observed in clinical cancer specimens, thereby sculpting the architecture of tumor cell populations under the Darwinian laws of natural selection. Vulnerability of the DNA to damage is influenced by (epi)genomic features and tissue specific properties of the DNA repair machinery. Nevertheless, the exquisite specificity with which mutationalprocesses can mutate the DNA allows for the computational inference of their activity in whole genome and whole exome sequenced cancers.

Thus, the cancer mutation landscape is the result of the combination of specific mutational processes operating in a tissue dependent context. The inference of cancer-type specific mutational signatures, the study of their dynamic activity during cancer evolution and of their role in shaping  the architecture of cancer cell populations is the object of our research.

Our goals:

Our goal is to understand the principles underlying cancer progression and therapy response.

We use patient-derived cancer cell lines to follow the evolving tumor population make up upon chemo and irradiation treatment. Observing tumor evolution in the making, we aim to identify cellular regulatory mechanisms relevant to tumor progression that can be harnessed with novel therapeutic strategies.

Our approach:

In order to understand how tumors grow and evolve in response to therapy, we perform functional studies on patient derived cell lines. Massive parallel sequencing and single cell profiling in combination with state of the art in house developed computational tools are used to infer evolving cancer cell populations and the dynamic processes that shape them both at the (epi)genomic and at the transcriptomic level.