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There is now a CONTENT FREEZE for Mercury while we switch to a new platform. It began on Friday, March 10 at 6pm and will end on Wednesday, March 15 at noon. No new content can be created during this time, but all material in the system as of the beginning of the freeze will be migrated to the new platform, including users and groups. Functionally the new site is identical to the old one. webteam@gatech.edu
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"Decoding the Non-coding RNAs in Ovarian Cancer"
Danny N. Dhanasekaran, Ph.D.
Professor, Department of Cell Biology
Director, Center for Basic Cancer Research
Deputy Director for Basic Research
University of Oklahoma, Cancer Institute
Ovarian cancer mortality is primarily due to late diagnosis of the disease and therapy resistance that lead to cancer recurrence. Our research is focused on identifying genetic and epigenetic mechanisms underlying ovarian cancer progression and recurrence. Recently, we identified the upregulation of UCA1, an oncogenic long non-coding RNA in ovarian cancer cells and issues. In addition to identifying the possible oncogenic mechanism mediated by UCA1, we observed that the inhibition of UCA1 could attenuate ovarian cancer growth. Our studies also point to UCA1 as a lncRNA signature that can
indicate therapy resistance. A global analysis of differentially expressed genes in ovarian cancer cells indicate the increased expression of several lncRNAs in ovarian cancer cells compared to normal ovarian surface epithelial or fallopian tube-derived epithelial cells. Co-expression network analysis of lncRNAs and mRNA identify several regulatory loops targeted by lncRNAs in controlling gene expression. Further characterization of these ovarian cancer specific lncRNAs should lead to the development of novel diagnostic, prognostic, and/or therapeutic agents for ovarian cancer.
