Dr O Sieber, Dr D Cheasley
No more applications being accepted
Competition Funded PhD Project (Students Worldwide)
About the Project
The human intestinal epithelium consists of a monolayer of epithelial cells that is maintained by a population of intestinal stem cells.
These have the capacity to self-renew and give rise to all the principal differentiated cell types: absorptive cells, goblet cells, enteroendocrine cells, tuft cells and paneth cells. Similarly, intestinal cancers may retain some degree of a deregulated hierarchy of differentiation, but this remains poorly understood. There is increasing evidence that tumour cell diversity has important implications for patient response to therapy.
This project will develop markers to isolate intestinal epithelial stem and progenitor cells in order to characterise their clonogenic potential, and to identify key regulators of stem cells self-renewal and differentiation.
Cancers will be evaluated for the maintenance of differentiation hierarchies, and distinct subpopulations studied for tumour-initiating capacity, metastatic potential and differential responses to existing and novel drug treatments.
This project will be supervised by:
Dr Oliver Sieber ([Email Address Removed]) http://www.wehi.edu.au/faculty_members/dr_oliver_sieber
Dr Dane Cheasley ([Email Address Removed] )
Research interests
Our laboratory aims to improve outcomes for patients with bowel cancer (colorectal cancer) through identification of robust molecular markers to support clinical decision-making.
We are conducting population-based genetic discovery and validation studies involving international patient cohorts and using microarray, DNA sequencing and bioinformatics technologies.
Patient biomarker studies are being complemented with functional genomics and drug treatment studies on bowel cancer cell lines to advance our understanding of tumor molecular biology.
Funding Notes
All PhD students at the institute must have a scholarship from The University of Melbourne or through another government, trust or philanthropic organisation. Before applying for a scholarship, you must have agreed on a project with an institute supervisor.
For further information regarding scholarships (both local and international), see Melbourne Scholarships http://services.unimelb.edu.au/scholarships/research