Iuliana Lazar
- Department of Biological Sciences
- College of Science
Synopsis:
Dr. Lazar’s research is focused on studying breast cancer cell cycle, signaling, metastatic processes, biomarker/drug-target discovery, and the development of microfluidic and mass spectrometry technologies for interrogating biological systems.
Description:
Cancer is a disease of the cell cycle that results in uncontrolled proliferation of cells. In our laboratory, we explore the molecular mechanisms of breast cancer cell cycle regulation by using holistic, mass spectrometry-based systems biology approaches. We develop proteomic technologies for investigating the pathways that enable cancer cells to bypass tightly regulated molecular checkpoints, proliferate in an unrestrained manner, metastasize and hijack normal biological function.
Further, we capitalize on the power of our proteomic data to identify novel therapeutic drug-targets, and to develop microfluidic architectures for targeted detection of biomarkers indicative of disease. To better interpret the large datasets that we generate, we are further interested in developing mathematical models that will help us identify novel disease genes and drug targets. The research topics and the interdisciplinary methodologies that we utilize for investigating biological problems enable students to evolve in a stimulating environment and interact synergistically with each other to explore fundamental biological and biomedical science questions.