Page 28 - Hormel Institute Annual Report 2021-22

Jarrod French, PhD
“Cancer cells reprogram their metabolism
to support their rapid rate of growth. If we
can better understand the differences in
their metabolic pathways, we can exploit this knowledge to develop novel therapies that treat
cancer by selectively starving cancer cells.”
Jarrod French
Lab research activities:
https://www.hi.umn.edu/research/research-sections/ nucleotide-metabolism-drug-discovery/
ORCID iD: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-6762-1309
28 | THE HORMEL INSTITUTE // Nucleotide Metabolism and
Drug Discovery
ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR
UNIVERSITY OF MINNESOTA
Our lab uses an integrative and highly collaborative approach to identify the molecular determinants of protein
function and dysfunction in various physiological contexts. We are particularly interested in proteins and protein complexes that regulate metabolic processes such as nucleotide bio- synthesis, the discovery and development of immunomodulatory therapies, and the mech- anisms that certain photoreceptors use for signal transduction. We draw
upon the broad skill set of our multi-disciplinary team and
the wide array of chemical, biochemical and biophysical techniques at our disposal. The overarching goal of our work is to use the knowledge that we obtain in these fundamental investigations to improve the standard of care for a range of devastating human diseases.
Current research projects
Assembly mechanisms, regulation and function
of higher order protein structures of nucleotide metabolism – We are working to understand how large structures of proteins, called biomolecu-
lar condensates are assembled, organized and transfixed in cells (Fig 1). These types of struc- tures help to regulate, both in space and time, how important cellular nutrients are made and broken down. The purine biosynthetic pathway is a particularly important target for the develop- ment of anti-cancer treatments because rapidly growing cancer cells require vast amounts of purines to proliferate.
Modulation of the purine metabolic proteins, FGAMS and PPAT, to improve liver cancer prognosis – We have recently observed that there is a correlation between the survival rate for hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC), the most prevalent form of liver cancer, and the expression level for two proteins involved in making purine nucleotides. We are working to identify how these proteins contribute to poor prognosis
in HCC patients, and hope to use our findings to develop new prognostic tests for HCC and identify new ways to treat advanced stage liver cancer.