Short biography
Born in 1970, in Barcelona.
MD (Universitat Autonoma de Barcelona, 1994), Pathologist (IMAS-Hospital del Mar, 1998), PhD (Life and Health Sciences, Universitat Pompeu Fabra, 2003).
I did my PhD training at the UBCM, at the Institut Municipal d'Investigacio Medica (IMIM) in Barcelona.
In 2002 I was awarded with a postgraduate grant from "Fundacio La Caixa" and started a postdoctoral period at the Institute for Cancer Genetics (Columbia University), until 2007.
Then I was awarded with an ICREA Junior Researcher contract last year. Since MArch 2008, I am the group leader of a new research group within the Cancer Research Program, at IMIM-HMAR (Parc de Recerca Biomedica de BArcelona, PRBB). Research interests
Last year we described a novel, non-transcriptional role for c-Myc in the control of DNA replication initiation. This biological activity is essential for Myc's role in cell proliferation, and is a main source of Myc-dependent DNA damage, which is a known effect of Myc deregulation.
Myc deregulation occurs in almost 50% of known human tumors, but the relevance of Myc-dependent DNA damage in tumorigenesis has not been yet ascertained. We know now that during the precancerous stage of many neoplasias, DNA damage is a common phenomenon, and appears as a consequence of the effect that proto-oncogenes (as c-Myc) have on DNA replication.
My research focuses on understanding the mechanisms by which c-Myc generates replication stress and subsequent DNA damage, and assess how all these events are involved in tumor initiation and progression upon Myc deregulation. Key words
life, cancer, tumor initiation, c-Myc, dna replication, dna damage, genomic instability