Prof. Devrim Gözüacik
Thursday, December 12th 2024, at 13:00, CET
The role of autophagy in cancer biology and implications for cancer treatment
Professor Devrim Gozuacik obtained his Medical Doctor (MD) degree from Hacettepe School of Medicine in Ankara, his MS degree of Biochemistry from Ecole Polytechnique, Paris and his PhD degree of cancer cell biology from Pasteur Institute and Necker Children’s Hospital and Research Center, Paris. Then, he moved to the Weizmann Institute of Science for his postdoctoral studies on cancer-cell death connections. After 14 years of academic career in Sabanci University, he was appointed in 2020, as a Research Professor in Koç University School of Medicine and as a Senior Researcher in Koç University Research Center for Translational Medicine (KUTTAM). He also holds a part-time Senior Researcher position in SUNUM Nanotechnology Center of Excellence.
Prof. Gozuacik serves as a Member of the Management Board of Izmir Biomedicine and Genome Center, Advisory Board Member of the NIH-supported AIM Center of Biomedical Research Excellence in the University of New Mexico, USA, Advisory Board Member of Hacettepe Institute of Child Health and a Board Member of New York-based International Cell Death Society. He also serves as the Associate Editor of the Autophagy journal (SCI IF: 13.3), and as an Editorial Board Member of Cancer Letters (SCI IF: 9.7) and Cell Communication and Signaling journals (SCI IF: 8.4) and The Turkish Journal of Biology. In the past, Prof. Gozuacik served as an Advisory Board Member of TÜSEB Biotechnology Institute. He played an active role in the establishment of SUNUM Nanotechnology Center of Excellence and EFSUN Nanodiagnostics Center of Excellence where he contributed as a Founding Board Member. He was also a Founding Board Member of Turkish Molecular Biology Association (MBD) and Cell Death Research Association (HÖAD), national professional associations in Turkey. Furthermore, he served as a project and academic referee for international agencies, such as Cancer Research-UK, Wellcome Trust and several European and international granting agencies.
Prof. Gozuacik is a recipient of several scientific awards, including Hoffmann-La Roche “Bioscience Leaders of the Next Decade”, EMBO SDIG Award, Turkish Journalists Society (TGC) Sedat Simavi Award, Turkish Academy of Sciences GEBİP Award, IKU Onder Oztunali Award and Elginkan Foundation Technology Award and the prestigious TÜBİTAK Science Award in Health Sciences. Prof. Gozuacik gave invited talks in >100 conferences, including Gordon Research Conferences, EMBO Meetings and Keystone Symposia, and co-organized 12 international conferences and meetings in Turkey and abroad. He is the author of >100 publications that received >22.000 citations. He filed 14 medical patents.
Prof. Gozuacik’s current research focuses on the study of basic autophagy signaling in mammalian cells and autophagy abnormalities in human diseases, especially in cancer. Through interdisciplinary collaborations, he contributes to the development of novel diagnosis, follow-up and treatment strategies. Prof. Gozuacik is an active member of several international communities, including the autophagy, cell death, cancer and targeted drug discovery communities.
Webinar Summary: Autophagy is key biological event that occurs at low basal levels in all cell types from yeast to mammals under non-deprived conditions, performing homeostatic functions such as protein degradation and organelle (e.g., mitochondria) turnover. It is rapidly upregulated during cellular stress, providing cells with recycled intracellular building blocks and substrates for energy generation and survival.
Autophagy dysregulation or abnormalities play a critical role in the pathogenesis and progress of several human health problems, including neurodegenerative disorders, inflammation, and cancer.
In our laboratory, we focus on the discovery of novel autophagy regulators and study implications of our findings in disease pathogenesis and diagnosis. Moreover, we investigate means to modulate autophagy for treatment purposes. In this speech, selected results of our research on autophagy, and its role in cancer formation, metastasis and cancer microenvironment interactions and our efforts in drug development will be presented.
Selected References: 1) Sari et al., Front Cell Dev Biol. 2024; 2) Akkoc et al., Front Oncol. 2021; 3) Akkoc and Gozuacik, Biochim Biophys Acta, Mol Cell Res. 2020
Link to join the webinar: https://us06web.zoom.us/j/87855382075?pwd=JFa9ObTuKe3Yao2XVEXB6HXdVjei9q.1