Birts, Charles - University of Southampton

个人简介

As a Career Track Research Fellow within the Faculty of Medicine, my research investigates altered cellular metabolism in cancer cells and how these metabolic changes can fuel tumour growth in both Breast and Oesophageal cancer. Increasing our understanding of these important cellular pathways will help identify new therapeutic targets and lead to better treatment strategies against cancer. Dr. Charles Birts graduated from the University of Southampton in 2003 with a first class degree in Biochemistry and Pharmacology. Subsequently he went on to complete a BBSRC funded PhD investigating the role of human gIIA phospholipase A2 in infection and trauma, under the supervision of Prof. David Wilton. During this time he was awarded ‘Young Biochemist of the Year 2005’ at the Bioscience conference in Glasgow. Following his PhD, Dr. Birts joined the laboratory of Dr. Jeremy Blaydes within the Cancer Sciences Unit in the Faculty of Medicine as a postdoctoral research fellow. After two successful postdoctoral positions he is now looking to develop his own research independence. Dr. Birts’ main research interests are focused towards investigating the molecular mechanisms that control changes in cellular metabolism in cancer cells.

研究领域

Human tumours are characterised by changes in cellular glycolytic metabolism that can engender a selective advantage to their growth and survival. Furthermore, glycolytic metabolites can modulate a tumour phenotype through the regulation of oncogenes and tumour suppressor genes. My research is focused on investigating the molecular mechanisms that control changes in cellular metabolism in cancer cells, specifically on a family of proteins called CtBPs. CtBPs are transcriptional co-repressors sensitive to cellular glycolytic metabolites NAD+/NADH, allowing them to sense changes in glycolytic flux. Cancer cells show increased glycolysis due to either hypoxia or aerobic glycolysis (Warburg), resulting in an increase in intracellular NADH, promoting CtBP dimerisation. CtBP dimers form a chromatin modifying complex through the interaction with multiple cellular proteins including transcription factors (e.g. Zeb) and histone modifying enzymes (e.g. histone methyltransferases, histone acetyltransferases, and polycomb group proteins). Through this CtBPs have been implicated in the regulation of many pathways that drive the hallmarks of cancer, including cell proliferation, migration and invasion, and cell survival.

近期论文

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Transcription of click-linked DNA in human cells - Birts, Charles N., Sanzone, A. Pia, El-Sagheer, Afaf H., Blaydes, Jeremy P., Brown, Tom and Tavassoli, Ali Published:2014Publication:Angewandte Chemie International Edition in EnglishVolume:53, (9)Page Range:2362-2365doi:10.1002/anie.201308691PMID:24452865 A cyclic peptide inhibitor of C-terminal binding protein dimerization links metabolism with mitotic fidelity in breast cancer cells - Birts, Charles N., Nijjar, Sharandip K., Mardle, Charlotte A., Hoakwie, Franciane, Duriez, Patrick J., Blaydes, Jeremy P. and Tavassoli, Ali Published:2013Publication:Chemical ScienceVolume:4, (8)Page Range:3046-3057doi:10.1039/c3sc50481f Targeting tumour proliferation with a small-molecule inhibitor of AICAR Transformylase Homodimerization - Spurr, Ian B., Birts, Charles N., Cuda, Francesco, Benkovic, Stephen J., Blaydes, Jeremy P. and Tavassoli, Ali Published:2012Publication:ChemBioChemVolume:13, (11)Page Range:1628-1634doi:10.1002/cbic.201200279PMID:22764122 CtBPs promote mitotic fidelity through their activities in the cell nucleus - Birts, C N, Bergman, L M and Blaydes, J P Published:2011Publication:OncogeneVolume:30Page Range:1271-1280doi:10.1038/onc.2010.507PMID:21057548