Research Areas

Areas of study include:

• Lipid metabolism and points of intersection of metabolic pathways with oncogenic signal transduction mechanisms
• The role of circulating cholesterol in prostate cancer cell growth and survival and opportunities for inhibition of disease progression using cholesterol targeting strategies
• Tumor cell plasticity, particularly the origin and significance of the poorly understood amoeboid tumor cell phenotype
• Chromatin structure in relation to androgen receptor function, lipid metabolism and metabolic pathways
• The role of bioactive extracellular vesicles ("oncosomes") produced by tumor cells and the profiling of these particles for the purpose of developing biomarker signatures that report tumor characteristics and response to therapy
• Quantitative mass spectrometry-based proteomics as a means of studying signal transduction and biomarker discovery.

Studies in our laboratory are supported by the National Institute of Health, the U.S. Department of Defense, the Spielberg Prostate Cancer Discovery Fund and the Martz Translational Breast Cancer Research Fund.