Molecular Pharmacology, Toxicology & Experimental Therapeutics

Brock C. Christensen, Ph.D.

Photograph by Jon Gilbert Fox
Assistant Professor of Community and Family Medicine
Research Description: Epigenetic and genetic molecular epidemiology with a focus on etiologic exposures, risk, and outcomes of human cancers as they relate to DNA methylation, miRNA expression, and miRNA-related polymorphisms.

Michael Cole, Ph.D.

Professor of Pharmacology and Toxicology and Genetics, Norris Cotton Cancer Center Member
Research Description: Molecular basis of cancer; with emphasis on the role of transcription factors and chromatin modification on tumor cell growth with major emphasis on the Myc oncogen family and its role in the growth of both cancer and normal cells.

Ruth W. Craig, Ph.D.

Professor of Pharmacology and Toxicology
Research Description: Understanding how a key regulator of cell viability discovered in the laboratory, MCL1, contributes to tumorigenesis and can be targeted for cancer therapy.

James DiRenzo, Ph.D.

Associate Professor of Pharmacology and Toxicology
Research Description: Regulation of proliferation, self-renewal and cellular differentiation in mammary epithelial stem cells. Mammary gland carcinogenesis, tumor stem cell theory, genetic control over stem cell renewal.

Ethan Dmitrovsky, M.D.

Andrew G. Wallace Professor and Chair of Pharmacology and Toxicology, American Cancer Society Clinical Research Professor
Research Description: Translational research (bench to bedside) and studies of vitamin A derivatives known as retinoids and their roles in tumor cell differentiation therapy and chemoprevention.

Alan R. Eastman, Ph.D.

Professor of Pharmacology and Toxicology; Director, Molecular Therapeutics Program, NCCC;
Director, PEMM
Research Description: Cancer chemotherapy. Mechanisms of drug action: unbiased screen for novel drug targets and identification of selective anticancer drugs. Novel drug combinations: modulation of cell cycle arrest induced by DNA damaging agents; modulation of Bcl-2 proteins to enhance apoptosis.

Alexei F. Kisselev, Ph.D.

Associate Professor of Pharmacology and Toxicology, Norris Cotton Cancer Center
Research Description: Mechanisms of selective killing of malignant cells by proteasome inhibitors; development and therapeutic application of specific inhibitors of proteasome different active sites; potential new targets in the ubiquitin-proteasome pathway.

Manabu Kurokawa, Ph.D.

Assistant Professor of Pharmacology & Toxicology
Research Description: Regulation of cell death and chemoresistance in cancer: The goal of our laboratory is to understand how and why cancer cells survive and how they evade programmed cell death, or apoptosis, to acquire chemoresistance.

Lionel D. Lewis, M.D.

Professor of Medicine and of Pharmacology and Toxicology
Research Description: The study of novel antineoplastic agents and their pharmacokinetics and pharmacodynamics when first given to cancer patients (i.e. first time in man, Phase I studies of new drugs in cancer patients); mechanisms of toxicity of nucleoside analogues and antineoplastic agents to the mitochondrion and ways of ameliorating this toxicity.

Christopher H. Lowrey, M.D.

Professor of Medicine (Hematology/Oncology) and of Pharmacology and Toxicology
VIce Chair, Department of Medicine
Research Description: Role of epigenetics and cell stress signaling in normal and disease-related blood cell production; development of novel pharmacologic therapies for sickle cell disease, thalassemia and leukemia.

Carmen J. Marsit, Ph.D.

Photograph by Jon Gilbert Fox
Assistant Professor of Pharmacology & Toxicology, and of Community and Family Medicine
Research Description: My research is focused on understanding the role that exposures and lifestyle play in determining the character of the human epigenome. This highly interdisciplinary and collaborative work, relying on both laboratory biology as well as epidemiology and biostatistics, examines molecular alterations in human tissues and correlates these alterations to various epidemiologic and clinical measures to better understand the mechanisms by which exposures lead to pathologies.

Todd Miller, Ph.D.

Assistant Professor of Pharmacology & Toxicology
Research Description: Research in the Miller Laboratory focuses on the translational application of knowledge of cell signaling pathways to therapeutics for breast cancer. Our work spans the spectrum of basic cancer biology, through translational studies in mouse models and human tissues, and interfaces with clinical trials. We use an array of methods and technologies both in our lab and through interaction with core facilities, including mammalian tissue culture, molecular analyses of gene and protein expression, gene expression microarrays, chromatin immunoprecipitation, next-generation DNA sequencing, bioinformatics, protein microarrays, mass spectrometry, mouse models, and live animal imaging.

Bill D. Roebuck, Ph.D.

Professor of Pharmacology and Toxicology
Research Description: Modulation of acute and chronic toxicity and carcinogenic processes by cancer chemopreventive agents; evaluation of the effects of dietary dithiolethiones on prevention of liver cancer; chemoprevention of cancer.

Yolanda Sanchez, Ph.D.

Associate Professor of Pharmacology and Toxicology
Research Description: Checkpoint signaling events triggered during the response to DNA damage or replication interference, how they regulate cell cycle progression, DNA repair and cell death. The role of checkpoints in the etiology of cancer and as drug targets for therapeutic enhancers of genotoxic cancer drugs.

Mark Spaller, Ph.D.

Associate Professor of Pharmacology & Toxicology, Assistant Professor (Adjunct) of Chemistry
Research Description: Discovery and development of cellular probes and therapeutic agents targeting protein-protein interactions; chemical biology; peptide and organic small molecule synthesis; combinatorial chemistry; chemical libraries for in vitro and cell-based screening; biophysical analysis of protein-ligand interactions.

Michael J. Spinella, Ph.D.

Associate Professor of Pharmacology and Toxicology
Research Description: Mechanistic links between stem cell pluripotency and cancer and identification of downstream genes signaling induced differentiation of solid tumors, especially in response to retinoids; finding causative genes in those tumors that are cured with differentiation and cytotoxic therapy.

Michael B. Sporn, M.D.

Oscar M. Cohn '34 Professor of Pharmacology and Toxicology
Research Description: Chemoprevention of cancer and other diseases caused by inflammatory and oxidative stress; transforming growth factor-beta (TGF-beta); development of new synthetic triterpenoids and rexinoids as drugs, studies on molecular mechanism of action.

Craig Tomlinson, Ph.D.

Assistant Professor of Medicine and of Pharmacology and Toxicology.
Research Description: Our laboratory studies the role of aryl hydrocarbon receptor in adult-onset diseases from in utero exposures to environmental toxicants, pancreatic cancer, and the development of high throughput genomics as a tool to predict the outcome of gene/environment interactions.