Arkaitz Carracedo
acarracedo
Arkaitz Carracedo
PRINCIPAL INVESTIGATOR

Ikerbasque Research Professor

Email: acarracedo@cicbiogune.es
Phone: 4447 / 944 061 308
Address: Bizkaia Science and Technology Park,
building 801A, Derio (Bizkaia)
Cancer Cell Signaling And Metabolism Lab
eberra
Edurne Berra
ASSOCIATE PRINCIPAL INVESTIGATOR

Email: eberra@cicbiogune.es
Phone: 4204 / 946572506
Address: Bizkaia Science and Technology Park,
building 801A, Derio (Bizkaia)

Edurne Berra got her Degree in Pharmacy at the University of Navarra (Pamplona, Spain) and a Licence Spéciale in Toxicology at the ULB (Brussels, Belgium). She started her research career, supervised by Dr J. Moscat at the CBM “Severo Ochoa” (Madrid, Spain), studying the signalling pathways triggered by the atypical PKC isotypes (PKCζ and λ). After a first postdoctoral at the Glaxo-Wellcome-CSIC laboratory of Molecular and Cell Biology (Madrid, Spain), Edurne moved to Dr J. Pouysségur’s lab (Nice, France) where she was appointed Chargé de Recherche (CNRS-CR1) and she got her HDR (Habilitation à la Direction de Recherche). In November 2007, Edurne joined CIC bioGUNE to lead her independent group, which is devoted to establish new players of the hypoxia signalling pathway, and to further translate this research to potential therapeutic applications in hypoxia related pathologies such as cancer. 

Edurne has authored more than 50 scientific publications in highly prestigious journals (Cell, EMBO Journal, PNAS...) that received more than 7000 citations. Edurne has been awarded the Fundación Renal “Iñigo Alvarez de Toledo” Prize (2007), the “Dr Joseph Amalrich” Prize for Excellence in Cancer Research (2002) and the HFSP (1999) and EMBO (1998) Fellowships. Edurne is member of the Spanish Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology (SEBBM), the Spanish Society for Cancer Research (ASEICA) and the European Association for Cancer Research (EACR), and she is on the committee of the Spanish and the European Hypoxia Network

The research in the Carracedo lab is aimed at deconstructing the essential requirements of cancer cells with special emphasis on the translation of the acquired knowledge from bench to bedside. In order to define the genuine features of cancer cells, we focus on the signalling and metabolic alterations in prostate and breast cancer. Through the use of a hierarchical approach with increasing complexity, we work on cell lines and primary cultures (using cell and molecular biology technologies), mouse models of prostate cancer that are faithful to the human disease and the analysis of human specimens through the development of prospective and retrospective studies. Our work stems from the hypothesis that cancer is driven by signalling and metabolic alterations that, once identified, can be targeted for therapy. The center and our collaborator institutions offer state-of-the-art technologies (from OMICS to in vivo imaging), which allow us to build and answer our hypotheses with high level of confidence.
To address our scientific questions in cancer, the Carracedo lab has developed a series of research lines:

  • Bioinformatics-based discovery. The lab takes full advantage on publicly available human prostate and breast cancer datasets in order to identify candidate genes to contribute to cancer pathogenesis, progression and response to therapy. Best hits are then validated employing genetic mouse models, xenograft surrogate assays and the latest advances in cellular and molecular biology combined with OMICs technologies.
  • Genetic mouse models as a source for the identification of novel cancer players. Genetically engineered mouse models (GEMMs) can faithfully recapitulate many aspects of human cancer. Dr. Carracedo envisions the molecular analysis of GEMMs with high throughput technologies as a mean to identify novel cancer-related genes. These hits are then validated through the analysis of human cancer specimens and cellular and molecular biology approaches.
  • Multi-OMICs analysis for non-invasive biomarker identification. Biofluids are the perfect source for cancer biomarkers that can inform about the presence or features of cancer. The lab has undertaken a biomarker discovery approach by applying the latest OMICs technologies to biofluid specimens from well-annotated prostate cancer patients, in order to define better molecules that inform about this disease.