Research directions
Cancer cell proteostasis
All human cells must assemble - and later break down - the right proteins at the right time and in the right quantities. To do this, they need to use and recycle building blocks such as amino acids and supply energy to the molecular machines that make and break down proteins. The fine orchestration of these processes represents a considerable challenge that cells must continually master, given that a correct cellular 'proteome' (the complete set of proteins) is essential for cells to function properly.
Cancer cells generally grow and multiply more rapidly than normal cells. They are therefore thought to be particularly dependent on the processes that regulate the proteome to keep pace with the high rate of protein turnover. Disrupting these mechanisms is a promising therapeutic approach and has already led to new treatments for certain cancers, such as multiple myeloma, a malignant disease of the bone marrow. Our team is working to better understand how different cancers try to keep their proteome in order and to find ways of targeting these mechanisms with new drugs. To do this, we use a so-called systems biology or multi-omics approach, in which different technologies are used to study several cellular processes in parallel (for example, to understand how cellular metabolism changes when certain genes are actively transcribed and translated into proteins). If you are interested in participating in these studies as part of a project, please contact Prof Holger Auner directly for more information.
For a full list of publications search for author "Auner HW" in pubmed.
