Detail

Research interests

My research interests are centered around the study of lung metastasis in pediatric tumors, and the development of personalized medicine for their treatment. I am particularly interested in utilizing various 3D models, co-culture techniques and organoids, to study the complex interactions between cancer cells and their microenvironment in the metastatic niche.

I am exploring the use of high-throughput screening and molecular targeted therapy to identify effective drug combinations for treating lung metastasis in pediatric tumors. I am also developing drug screening assays and utilizing spatial transcriptomics and single-cell RNAseq to gain a deeper understanding of the molecular changes that occur during the process of metastasis.

In addition to my focus on lung metastasis in pediatric tumors, I am interested in the application of these approaches to other types of cancer, and the development of personalized medicine for cancer treatment more broadly. I believe that by combining these cutting-edge technologies with a systems-level understanding of cancer biology, we can make significant progress in developing more effective treatments for pediatric tumors and other cancers.

Techniques, methods & infrastructure

Organoid culture; Working with patient samples from pediatric patients with solid tumors that have a potential to metastasize to the lung; 3D models, including 3D bioprinted scaffolds; Drug libraries; Combinatorial drug screens; High-throughput screens; Imaging techniques; Various biochemical and molecular biology assays; single-cell RNA sequencing; Spatial transcriptomics

Selected publications

1. Tsafou, K. et al. (2018) ‘Identifying the druggable interactome of EWS-FLI1 reveals MCL-1 dependent differential sensitivities of Ewing sarcoma cells to apoptosis inducers’, Oncotarget, 9(57), pp. 31018–31031. Available at: http://dx.doi.org/10.18632/oncotarget.25760.
2. Radic-Sarikas, B. et al. (2017) ‘Lapatinib potentiates cytotoxicity of  YM155 in neuroblastoma via inhibition of the ABCB1 efflux transporter’, Scientific Reports, 7(1). Available at: http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41598-017-03129-6.
3. Radic-Sarikas, B. et al. (2017) ‘Combinatorial Drug Screening Identifies Ewing Sarcoma–specific Sensitivities’, Molecular Cancer Therapeutics, 16(1), pp. 88–101. Available at: http://dx.doi.org/10.1158/1535-7163.mct-16-0235.
4. Winter, G.E. et al. (2014) ‘The solute carrier SLC35F2 enables YM155-mediated DNA damage toxicity’, Nature Chemical Biology, 10(9), pp. 768–773. Available at: http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/nchembio.1590.
5. Huber, K.V.M. et al. (2014) ‘Stereospecific targeting of MTH1 by (S)-crizotinib as an anticancer strategy’, Nature, 508(7495), pp. 222–227. Available at: http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/nature13194.