Faculty Research: Song-Tao Liu
Over 90% of solid tumors are aneuploid. The long-term goal of our research is to understand
and exploit aneuploidy in cancers. To this end, we have been investigating both subcellular
structures (the centromere/kinetochore complex) and regulatory mechanisms (the mitotic
checkpoint) involved in chromosome segregation. As recent results have found that
aneuploid cancer cells require additional genetic or epigenetic alterations to survive
and proliferate, we also aim to identify recurring modifications in aneuploid cancers
and test whether they can be used for aneuploid cancer prognosis and treatment.
Even though many cancer "signature" genes have been proposed, the biological functions
of some of them remain unclear. We currently focus on characterizing certain chromosomal
instability (CIN) signature genes in breast cancers. We have realized the limitations
of regular 2D cell culture in studying cancers so are in different 3D cell culture
systems and animal models into our research.
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