Cornelia Peterson
Tufts University, MA·Medicine & Clinical Research·Early-career
Sebaceous carcinoma is a cancer of the oil-producing glands. Around the eye, it most often starts in the Meibomian glands (MGs), the specialized oil glands of the eyelid.
- Fields
Medicine & Clinical Research
Genetics
Biology
- Topics
sebaceous carcinoma
ocular adnexa
Meibomian gland
- Grants
- 1 known grant, through Apr 2029
What they work on
- Test how turning the insulin/insulin-like growth factor signaling (IIS) pathway up or down with drugs and genetic tools changes MYC levels, behavior and gene activity in cultured normal and tumor meibocytes, the oil-producing eyelid gland cells.
- Define how raising or lowering MYC, a growth-driving gene, changes the features and gene-expression profile of normal and cancerous meibocytes grown in culture.
- Use genetically engineered mice to test whether MYC overexpression alone, or combined with loss of the Trp53 tumor-suppressor gene, transforms the Meibomian gland into cancer.
- Examine how MYC overexpression in the eyelid gland affects surrounding cells, including whether it suppresses local immune responses, in the mouse models.
More about the research
These tumors invade nearby tissue and spread along the surface layer into the conjunctiva, the membrane covering the eye. This makes complete surgical removal hard and raises the risk of spread to distant sites. Up to 40% of patients die from the disease. Surgery can threaten sight, and the genetic changes driving the cancer are still poorly understood.
Why it matters
Patients with eyelid sebaceous carcinoma face frequent recurrence, metastasis and sight-threatening surgery, and few treatments work against the disease. Learning how MYC is switched on and what it does in these tumors could point to targets for precision therapies. Such therapies could tailor treatment to each tumor's molecular features.
Known grants
From NIH and NSF research grants. Labs often have other funding we can't see.
Closest labs
John Fowlkes
University of Kentucky, KY·Physiology
Determine how deficiencies of insulin and insulin-like growth factor 1 (IGF-1) each contribute to diabetic bone disease at the tissue, cellular and molecular levels in models of type 1 diabetes.
James Jester
University of California-Irvine, CA·Medicine & Clinical Research
Test whether loss of Pparg, a gene regulator of meibocyte differentiation, in stem/progenitor cells causes age- and sex-dependent gland atrophy and dry eye, using Sox9-Cre and Lrig1-Cre knockout mice at 1, 3 and 6 months.
Luis Parada
Indiana University-Purdue University-Indianapolis, IN·Medicine & Clinical Research
Test whether NF1-mutant glioblastomas have distinct tumor cell properties and immune microenvironments, using engineered mice lacking NF1, Tp53 and Pten compared with NF1-normal QKi/Tp53/Pten mice.
The school
Tufts University: 19 labs on PI Pages, $278M a year on research, 144 research doctorates a year.
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