Role of the RNA binding protein UNR in cancer progression

Venue: Edificio Povo 2, via Sommarive nr. 9, Povo (Tn) - Room B103
 At 2:00 p.m.

• Fatima Gebauer Hernandez -  Gene Regulation, Stem Cells and Cancer Programme, Center for Genomic Regulation (CRG), Barcelona, Spain

RNA binding proteins (RBPs) are essential players in RNA metabolism, and are gaining great attention in the oncology field for their potential to regulate essentially every hallmark of tumor development. The molecular mechanisms by which RBPs modulate cancer progression are very poorly understood. My talk will focus on the RNA binding protein UNR/ CSDE1, a protein conserved from Drosophila to humans. We have shown that UNR regulates X-chromosome dosage compensation in Drosophila by using very different mechanisms in male and female flies. Our results in Drosophila led us to suspect of a role of UNR in cancer progression, a research line that we have followed using melanoma as a model system. Indeed, we have found that UNR has oncogenic properties and selectively promotes melanoma metastasis. I will show our approach to identify cancer-relevant targets of UNR, a system that has also led us to identify new mechanisms of regulation by this protein.