Owen Sansom,

FRSE Fellowship of the Royal Society of Edinburgh (FRSE) is an award granted to individuals that the Royal Society of Edinburgh, Scotland's national academy of science and letters, judged to be "eminently distinguished in their subject". This soci ...

., FMedSci is the Director of the Cancer Research UK Beatson Institute (formerly known as the Beatson Institute for Cancer Research). He is known for his work determining the molecular hallmarks of

colorectal cancer Colorectal cancer (CRC), also known as bowel cancer, colon cancer, or rectal cancer, is the development of cancer from the colon or rectum (parts of the large intestine). Signs and symptoms may include blood in the stool, a change in bowel m ...

(CRC), including demonstrating the roles of the tumour suppressor protein APC and the

WNT signalling pathway The Wnt signaling pathways are a group of signal transduction pathways which begin with proteins that pass signals into a cell through cell surface receptors. The name Wnt is a portmanteau created from the names Wingless and Int-1. Wnt signaling p ...

, as well as the involvement of intestinal

stem cell In multicellular organisms, stem cells are undifferentiated or partially differentiated cells that can differentiate into various types of cells and proliferate indefinitely to produce more of the same stem cell. They are the earliest type o ...

s in

tumourigenesis Carcinogenesis, also called oncogenesis or tumorigenesis, is the formation of a cancer, whereby normal cells are transformed into cancer cells. The process is characterized by changes at the cellular, genetic, and epigenetic levels and abno ...

Education

After obtaining a BSc in

genetics Genetics is the study of genes, genetic variation, and heredity in organisms.Hartl D, Jones E (2005) It is an important branch in biology because heredity is vital to organisms' evolution. Gregor Mendel, a Moravian Augustinian friar wor ...

from the

University of Nottingham The University of Nottingham is a public university, public research university in Nottingham, United Kingdom. It was founded as University College Nottingham in 1881, and was granted a royal charter in 1948. The University of Nottingham belongs t ...

and an MRes in Biology from the

University of Manchester , mottoeng = Knowledge, Wisdom, Humanity , established = 2004 – University of Manchester Predecessor institutions: 1956 – UMIST (as university college; university 1994) 1904 – Victoria University of Manchester 1880 – Victoria Univer ...

, Owen went on to obtain a PhD from the

University of Edinburgh The University of Edinburgh ( sco, University o Edinburgh, gd, Oilthigh Dhùn Èideann; abbreviated as ''Edin.'' in post-nominals) is a public research university based in Edinburgh, Scotland. Granted a royal charter by King James VI in 15 ...

Career

Owen was a postdoctoral fellow at

Cardiff University , latin_name = , image_name = Shield of the University of Cardiff.svg , image_size = 150px , caption = Coat of arms of Cardiff University , motto = cy, Gwirionedd, Undod a Chytgord , mottoeng = Truth, Unity and Concord , established = 1 ...

investigating the role of the ''APC'' gene in Wnt signalling and cancer. In 2005, he became a Junior Group Leader at the Cancer Research UK Beatson Institute, and in 2011 he was appointed the Institute's Deputy Director. In 2016, the Institute's Director, Professor

Karen Vousden Karen Heather Vousden, CBE, FRS, FRSE, FMedSci (born 19 July 1957) is a British medical researcher. She is known for her work on the tumour suppressor protein, p53, and in particular her discovery of the important regulatory role of Mdm2, a ...

moved to the

Francis Crick Institute The Francis Crick Institute (formerly the UK Centre for Medical Research and Innovation) is a biomedical research centre in London, which was established in 2010 and opened in 2016. The institute is a partnership between Cancer Research UK, Impe ...

and became CRUK's chief scientist, and Owen acted as interim Director of the Beatson Institute until being appointed as the next Director in 2017. He also leads the CRUK Glasgow Centre, which aims to bring together scientists and clinicians to work together on cancer research, drug discovery and patient care.

Research

The Phenotype of ''APC'' loss ''in vivo'' and key effector pathways

Owen was the first person to acutely delete the ''APC'' gene in the murine intestine, a model that he then used to elucidate the key pathways that ''APC'' controls ''in vivo''. Using this model system, Owen's group identified critical functional roles for genes such as ''MYC'', ''RAC'' and ''

MTOR The mammalian target of sirolimus, rapamycin (mTOR), also referred to as the mechanistic target of rapamycin, and sometimes called FK506-binding protein 12-rapamycin-associated protein 1 (FRAP1), is a kinase that in humans is encoded by the ''MT ...

''. Additionally, the use of this and other models has allowed Owen's group to identify potential chemoprevention strategies. For example, the group's work on aspirin showed that embryonic and perinatal exposure to aspirin suppresses neoplasia associated with the loss of Apc function.

Neutrophils in colorectal and other cancers

Owen's group showed that neutrophils are associated with the earliest stage of CRC, and using mouse models they showed that inhibition of the chemokine receptor

CXCR2 Interleukin 8 receptor, beta is a chemokine receptor. ''IL8RB'' is also known as ''CXCR2'', and CXCR2 is now the IUPHAR Committee on Receptor Nomenclature and Drug classification-recommended name. Function The protein encoded by this gene is ...

could suppress both colitis and spontaneous cancer. This was confirmed by the Dubois group in 2013. Owen's group continued these studies into the pancreas to show that inhibition of

suppresses metastasis in pancreatic cancer.

The cell of origin of colorectal cancer

In collaboration with Hans Clevers's laboratory, Owen's group showed that Lgr5-positive cells are an efficient cell of tumourigenesis. Within the same study, they also showed that non-stem cells lacking ''APC'' could form lesions but would rarely progress. Following on from these studies, the group worked with Florian Greten's laboratory to show that additional mutations can cause an expansion in the cell of origin. This work built upon work in Owen's laboratory on understanding the cooperation of APC with mutations in other genes such as ''

KRAS ''KRAS'' (Kirsten rat sarcoma virus) is a gene that provides instructions for making a protein called K-Ras, a part of the RAS/MAPK pathway. The protein relays signals from outside the cell to the cell's nucleus. These signals instruct the cell ...

'' and ''PTEN''.

Key regulators of metastasis

Owen's group has developed models of metastatic disease and identified critical components of the metastatic pathway, which has led to the design of trials specifically aimed at targeting metastatic disease in pancreatic cancer, e.g. Dasatanib in resectable pancreatic cancer patients. The group also provided definitive functional information on the role of mutant p53 in metastasis and mechanisms behind the process: integrin recycling, LOX, RHO The group also identified critical roles for

RAC RAC or Rac may refer to: Organizations * Radio Amateurs of Canada * RATCH-Australia Corporation, electricity generator * Refugee Action Collective (Victoria), Melbourne, Australia * Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism, US * Rent-A-Center, ...

and its

GEFs Generalized epilepsy with febrile seizures plus (GEFS+) is a syndromic autosomal dominant disorder where affected individuals can exhibit numerous epilepsy phenotypes. GEFS+ can persist beyond early childhood (i.e., 6 years of age). GEFS+ is a ...

in melanoma migration and metastasis.

Awards and honours

In 2007, Owen won th
Young Scientist Frank Rose Award
in recognition of his contributions to translational cancer research and in 2012 he was awarded th
CRUK Future Leaders in Cancer Research Prize
for his contributions to cancer research. He was also elected a Fellow of the

Royal Society of Edinburgh The Royal Society of Edinburgh is Scotland's national academy of science and letters. It is a registered charity that operates on a wholly independent and non-partisan basis and provides public benefit throughout Scotland. It was established i ...

in 2012 and a Fellow of the

Academy of Medical Sciences The Academy of Medical Sciences is an organisation established in the UK in 1998. It is one of the four UK National Academies, the others being the British Academy, the Royal Academy of Engineering and the Royal Society. Its mission is to adv ...

in 2017.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Sansom, Owen 1975 births Living people Alumni of the University of Nottingham Alumni of the University of Manchester Alumni of the University of Edinburgh British molecular biologists Fellows of the Royal Society of Edinburgh Fellows of the Academy of Medical Sciences (United Kingdom)