Supervisor View Full Details

• genetics, genomics and molecular biology
• cancer/oncology

• Surgery

• Endocrinology
• Oncology
• Other

Breast Cancer

All great research begins with a question and ends with an application with the objective of improving outcomes for patients. This can be in the form of better stratification of disease types, better clinical outcomes, better understanding of therapeutic response or better tools for cancer risk prediction.
As Professor of Surgery in NUI Galway, I have developed a major cancer research group, primarily focusing on breast cancer (www.nuigalway.ie/surgery/research). The group adopts a translational science method of research as a result of its clinical affiliation with the Symptomatic Breast Service at Galway University Hospitals and its network of breast cancer collaborators. The research group has access to a comprehensive breast cancer database and biobank stretching back over 20 years. In 2015 my lab moved into a new research facility, the Lambe Institute for Translational Research, of which I am Director. The major contributor to our research is the West of Ireland based charity, Breast Cancer Research (www.breastcancerresearch.ie) which has supported research at NUI Galway for 25 years.
The breast cancer research programmes at NUI Galway have been remarkably successful in developing national and international collaborations and outputs over the past decade. These include several major collaborative genome wide association studies which have been published extensively in Nature Genetics. For many years one of the primary areas of research has been gene and microRNA biomarkers for breast cancer and in recent years my group has published widely on microRNAs as well as developing patents in this area. We are a partner centre in the ?7.5million BREAST-PREDICT Collaborative Cancer Research Centre funded by the Irish Cancer Society. In addition we secured substantial funding from Science Foundation Ireland in partnership with the Biomedical Diagnostics Institute at Dublin City University. Researchers under this ONC2 award are developing a platform for measuring circulating microRNAs in a non-amplified manner (www.bdi.ie/research/onc.html).
My research team works with the Health Research Board-funded Clinical Research Facility Galway (CRFG) (www.nuigalway.ie/hrbcrfg/) Biostatistics and Clinical Trial units. I lead the translational trial ICORG 10-11 ?Circulating miRNAs: Novel Breast Cancer Biomarkers and Their Use for Guiding and Monitoring Response to Chemotherapy? which is currently recruiting patients at 11 national hospitals (http://www.cancertrials.ie/clinical-trials/). All sample analysis is carried out by researchers in my group.

Genetics of breast cancer - role of SNPs, correlation between tumour profiling and response to therapy
Molecular Profiling/Biomarker Discovery - targeted prospective clinical trials
Novel Imaging including Photoacoustics
MicroRNA-based diagnostics and therapeutics
Reconstructive strategies involving adipogenesis

The above represents a range of breast cancer-related projects that may be of interest to a potential clinician-scientist across a spectrum of disciplines including surgery, radiology, cancer genetics and medical oncology. We could tailor a project based on an individual's careers aspiration.