Dr Manav Pathania

Manav received a BA in Biology from Grinnell College, in Iowa, and received his PhD in Cell Biology from Yale University, in Connecticut. At Yale he investigated microRNA control of postnatal neural stem cell differentiation and survival in Professor Angelique Bordey’s lab. His first postdoctoral appointment was in Professor Josef Kittler’s lab at UCL in London, where he explored the neurobiological consequences of autism and schizophrenia candidate gene misexpression in vitro and in vivo. Following that, in his second postdoctoral appointment Manav developed in vivo models of paediatric high-grade glioma in Professor Paolo Salomoni’s lab at the UCL Cancer Institute. Manav is a junior group leader in the Centre working in the area of Diffuse Midline Gliomas.

The Pathania Lab

The Pathania lab focuses on developing newer, more refined, immune-competent models of gliomas and using these for CRISPR screening and single cell analyses. The aim is to use these models to identify mutation or tumour subtype-specific interactions between tumour cells and the stromal and immune compartments, with the further aim to evaluate these as targets for precision therapy development. A second focus is to use these models to reveal mechanisms contributing to the emergence of therapy resistance, a pervasive problem in the treatment of high-grade brain tumours

Carmo Cunha

Carmo received a BSc in Biological Sciences from Imperial College London, where she wrote her dissertation on NK cell immunotherapy for ovarian cancer under the supervision of Professor Hugh Brady. She then completed an MSc in Cancer at the Anthony Nolan Research Institute at UCL, where with Dr Diana Hernandez she investigated KIR haplotypes and their functional properties in umbilical cord blood-derived NK cells. In the Pathania Lab, Carmo is a Research Assistant investigating the role of partnering mutations and microenvironmental interactions in paediatric high-grade gliomas.

Dr Antonella De Cola

Antonella received her MSc and PhD degrees in Biochemistry and Molecular Biology from the University of Rome Tor Vergata (Italy), where she also qualified as a Medical Biotechnologist. During her PhD she identified roles for specific proteins in cell cycle regulation, cell death and histone gene transcription with Professor Gerry Melino. Her first postdoctoral position was with Professor Vincenzo De Laurenzi at CeSI-MeT University of Chieti-Pescara, where she studied microRNAs in patient-derived breast cancer stem cells. Specifically, she investigated the function of particular microRNAs in cancer stem cell survival, differentiation and therapy resistance both in vitro and in vivo. Her work has resulted in a number of publications and productive collaborations. In the Pathania Lab, Antonella will bring her considerable cancer biology expertise to bear and probe the roles of chromatin remodelling complexes in paediatric brain tumour initiation, maintenance and relapse.

Amelia Foss

Amelia is a PhD candidate in Oncology with the NIH-OxCam Program between the University of Cambridge (adv. Dr. Manav Pathania) and the US National Institutes of Health (adv. Dr. Kandice Tanner and Dr. Michael Gottesman, NCI). In her PhD, she is combining cell biology, in vivo modelling, and biophysics techniques to investigate progression of high-grade gliomas. Amelia received her BA in Molecular Biology from Princeton University, studying RNA modification with Dr. Elizabeth Gavis. She was then awarded a Fulbright fellowship to research kidney disease at Semmelweis Medical University. She received her MSc through the Erasmus Mundus Joint Master Degree program, studying between Heidelberg University and Uppsala University. At Heidelberg University, with Dr. Jonathan Sleeman, she investigated the role of senescence in metastatic melanoma, and at Uppsala University, in the lab of Dr. Anna Dimberg, Amelia studied vascular co-option in glioblastoma. At the NCI, she investigates mechanical properties of glioblastoma cells, and their molecular and mechanical interaction with the tumour microenvironment. In the Pathania Lab, Amelia is investigating genetic and epigenetic heterogeneity and the role of co-occurring mutations in invasion and stromal co-option in DIPG.

Michael McNicholas

Michael has recently graduated with a BSc from the University of Surrey where he carried out a wide variety of projects as part of a research-intensive undergraduate degree in Biochemistry. These included studying the DNA damage response in cancer cell lines with Lisiane Meira at Surrey, and the role of the opioid system and G-protein coupled receptors in addiction and associative learning in Brigitte Kieffer’s lab at McGill. As a PhD student in the Pathania Lab he will be working on understanding how histone mutations rewire the epigenome to induce DIPGs and the role of different co-occurring mutations in this process.

Dr Lucie Pepino

Lucie received her MSc and PhD degrees in Neuroscience from the University of Aix-Marseille (France). Her PhD project addressed sex-linked differences in an inflammatory pain model in Dr. Aziz Moqrich’s lab (advised by Dr. Ana Reynders). Her project was designed to explore differences in pain perception at various levels of analysis, including global behaviour, hormone contribution, and spinal gene expression, in response to inflammatory-evoked pain. By further exploring one of the top upregulated genes in males, she identified a male-female difference in neutrophil recruitment to the spinal meninges, and more specifically to the pia mater. In the Pathania lab, Lucie will investigate how partner mutations in H3K27M and H3.3G34R gliomas modify interactions between brain tumour cells and their microenvironment (blood vessels, microglia, neurons, astrocytes and infiltrating immune cells).