Krystyna Gieniec

Although bowel cancer is the third most common cancer in Australia, affecting 1 in 13 people annually, it is the second most deadly type of cancer as there is often little in the way of effective treatments for advanced disease. It is therefore imperative that we find new, better, ways to stop it. In recent years, the involvement of the connective tissue in cancer progression has been questioned. The connective tissue cell type I am particularly interested in is known as cancer-associated fibroblasts, or CAFs, although little is definitively known about their role in bowel cancer. It does appear, however, that most CAFs actively play a role in tumour progression. The Gut Cancer group and I have identified several proteins made by CAFs that are upregulated in bowel cancer and are associated with worse patient outcome, and I am now trying to understand their role in bowel cancer progression at a molecular level. To do this I have optimised many different assays to examine changes in the function of CAFs that produce or lack these proteins, and am also able to observe the effects these proteins have on tumour cells grown as three-dimensional organoids (‘mini-organs’ grown in a dish). Additionally, to determine if a lack of these proteins slows tumour growth and increases survival (either by using an inhibiting drug or removing the proteins at a genetic level), I utilise mouse models where bowel tumour organoids are injected into the colon via colonoscope (primary model) or liver via open surgery (metastatic model). I am then able to monitor tumour growth by live mouse colonoscopy and/or bioluminescence imaging.