8.10.24 Deciphering the Underpinnings of Stomach Cancer With the Help of an AACR Grant
Cancer With the Help of an AACR Grant
Valerie O’Brien, PhD, is using her microbiology expertise to model and study gastric cancer development with early support from a Debbie’s Dream Foundation-AACR grant.
As a graduate student at Washington University in St. Louis, Valerie O’Brien, PhD, studied chronic bacterial infections. Then, an opportunity to donate bone marrow to a young boy with leukemia motivated her to shift her focus.
“That got me interested in cancer because I could see how it was such an important disease worldwide,” she recalled. “I was looking for a way to combine [my] expertise with cancer.”
Dr. O’Brien chose to pursue a postdoctoral fellowship in the lab of Nina Salama, PhD, a professor, senior vice president of education, and the Dr. Penny E. Petersen Memorial Chair for Lymphoma Research at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center in Seattle, who studies a bacterium called Helicobacter pylori (H. pylori), which infects the inner lining of the stomach. According to the National Cancer Institute (NCI), the bacterium can survive for long periods of time by neutralizing stomach acid, burrowing into the mucus that coats the inside of the stomach, and possibly blocking immune responses.