Project Description Narrative:
Cancer remains the second leading cause of mortality in Wisconsin, second only to cardiovascular disease. Finding novel treatments for cancer is, therefore, one of the most processing challenges faced by biomedical researchers, creating a high priority for research funds. The broad objective of this project is to understand the molecular control of organ growth during development, which has direct relevance to the study and treatment of cancer.
The genetic code contains within it the capacity to direct cell growth and division, such that during development, a single cell ultimately elaborates an organism many billion times its size at the time of fertilization. After development has been completed, the embryonic growth programs remain largely dormant, et retained within the nucleus of nearly every cell in the body is the capacity for explosive growth. Given the right set of circumstances (mutations, chronic tissue damage), the embryonic growth program can become reactivated, resulting in unregulated growth and presenting clinically as cancer. For this reason, the study of development growth mechanisms is of critical importance.
The Midwest Athletes Against Childhood Cancer (MACC) Fund building aquaculture facility has a capacity to house more than 10,000 zebrafish, which allows the generation and maintenance of about 100 mutant and wild-type lines. The researchers in this project will probe the mechanisms of growth control using germline transgenesis.
The questions posed in this study will impinge directly on the diagnosis and treatment of cancer. By discerning the molecular connections that control growth, the researchers will provide targets for novel cancer therapies.