Pelotonia - Team Marion

2024, Wesley Bush, Biology major

Project:Evolution-Driven Purifying Selection in Cancer Cells.

Mentor: Ruben Petreaca, PhD

Idea Inspiration: If we can understand how cancer works, then we can understand how life works.

2023, Louis Gibson, neuroscience major

Project: Investigating DNA replication gene (polymerase E), which is known as a tumor suppression gene

Mentor: Ruben Petreaca, PhD

Idea inspiration:

2022: Devi Dheekshita Nelakurti, Biomedical Science major

Project: Chromosomal re-arrangements as drivers of cellular immortalization and cancer evolution

Mentor: Ruben C. Petreaca, PhD and Golkroh Mirzaei, PhD

Idea Inspiration: I have the potential to help develop effective and efficient detection and therapeutic methods for cancer to help save the lives of family members, friends and other loved ones.

2022: Shayaan Rasheed, Biology major

Project: Investigating the inhibition of PRMT5 through biochemical and computational approaches.

Mentor: Renee Bouley, PhD and Ryan Yoder, PhD

Idea Inspiration: I'm inspired by loved ones who've fought cancer. I intend to honor their struggles through my research towards eliminating cancer and its pervasive effects.

2021: Lauren Frank Zoology Major

Project: Determining how a chromatin remodeling protein interacts with RAD 52
Mentor – Renee Bouley, Ph.D and Ruben Petreaca, Ph.D

In lay terms, Frank said, “My project is studying proteins that are involved in DNA damage repair. RAD 52 is a protein that influences which pathway might be taken when DNA is being repaired.”
“There are different repair pathways. Some lead to more errors when DNA is repaired, and some are error free. When influenced to an error prone pathway overtime, the errors will build up and potentially lead to cancer,” she said.

2020: Hannah Hylton Biology Pre-Med Major

Project – Development of a Novel Genetic Assay to Interrogate DNA Double-Strand Break Repair Pathways 
Mentor – Ruben Petreaca, PhD

Idea Inspiration – Cancer is incredibly diverse and comes in different forms. With a wide variety of symptoms, treatment options continue to grow to account for the diversity that exists. Nevertheless, the initial steps in disease progression are similar for nearly all forms of cancers. When cells replicate, they often make mistakes that accumulate over time to change the genetic makeup of a cell and cause cancer. This project focuses on generating a platform to interrogate mechanisms that drive accumulation of genetic errors. 
My Pelotonia 2020 – Because my 20th birthday is in 2020, I’m running/hiking 120 miles

2019: Walla (Miguel) Disbennett

Project – Analysis of the Histone Chaperone HIRA in Promoting Intra-Chromosomal Deletions

Mentors – Ruben Petreaca Ph.D and Jian-Qiu Wu, Ph.D

Summary – When DNA copies itself inside of a cell, the process doesn’t always occur correctly and the two strands that compose the DNA can break. Cellular machineries exist to repair these breaks, but sometimes, these machineries fail. When such failures occur, genetic change accumulates and may cause cancer. We identified a mutation in yeast called Hip1 (human tumor suppressor HIRA) that decreases the rate of chromosomal deletions. Our goal is to understand how Hip1 fits into the overall repair process with the hope of outlining a genetic mechanism of chromosomal deletions.

2019 Pelotonia Participant – Virtual rider

2018: Bailey Lucas Zoology Major

Project – Genetic Analysis of Skb1 Function in DNA Double-Strand Break Repair
Mentor - Dr. Ruben Petreaca, Molecular Genetics

Summary – Investigate the function of the methyltransferase Skb1 in DNA double-strand break repair to better understand how DNA damage is repaired in living cells.
2018 Pelotonia Participant – Rider: 100 miles

Watch as Bailey shares more details about her research project. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7lcZSPF3hbw