The Cancer and Microbes Working Group will be holding regular meetings during the spring semester to showcase the collaborative projects initiated and supported by Cancer and Microbes connections.
Attendance is open to all. Presentations by students, postdocs, or others directly involved in the experimental workflow are encouraged.
Expansion microscopy to visualize neuronal F-actin ring
Presenter: Md Saddam Hossain Joy
Brief description: Expansion Microscopy (ExM) is a recent super-resolution microscopic technique that enables the visualization of sub-diffraction limited structures using a conventional optical microscope by physically enlarging the biological specimen itself. We are using this technique to visualize the recently discovered neuronal F-actin ring structure along the axon of the Drosophila larval motor neurons. These rings are approximately 200 nm apart from each other. However, many questions about these F-actin rings are still to be answered, like why 200 nm? and how the neurons maintain this 200 nm? We are using Expansion microscopy (ExM) to answer these questions. once we establish the ExM technique, it can be used for cancer research, like better understanding the 3D neuronal cancer microenvironment.
Investigate if liver cancer-associated microbiota modulate bile acid signaling in the gut
Presenter: Francois Reichardt
Brief description: Hepatocellular Carcinoma is associated with gut dysbiosis, favoring secondary bile acids production in the distal ileum. These bile acids are less potent activators of intestinal Farnesoid X Receptor, a known endogenous receptor of bile acids. Ileum organoids allow us to study the impact of different types of bile acids or microbiota by recreating in vitro enterocyte – bile acids – bacteria interactions and enable us to examine FXR signaling in ileal enterocytes.
