Tara B

Biography

Tara's PhD research is focusing on understanding the epigenetic mechanisms underlying pancreatic cancer chemoresistance.   Dynamic changes in chromatin structure play a key role in regulating genome function. Highly compacted chromatin structures are enriched in nucleosomes and are transcriptionally silent. In contrast, a net loss of nucleosomes from gene-specific regulatory regions increases chromatin accessibility, enables binding of transcriptional regulators, and initiates gene expression. However, the involvement of epigenetic enzymes in the regulation of specific gene expression programs and their genome wide addresses in relation to intrinsic and acquired chemotherapy resistance in pancreatic cancer has yet to be determined. This project will aim to establish how epigenetic enzymes directly engage with the epigenetic platform to contribute to the physiology and pathology of chemoresistance and how regions of the genome become transcriptionally accessible or repressed in response to chemotherapy treatments. Tara's PhD research is focusing on understanding the epigenetic mechanisms underlying pancreatic cancer chemoresistance.   Dynamic changes in chromatin structure play a key role in regulating genome function. Highly compacted chromatin structures are enriched in nucleosomes and are transcriptionally silent. In contrast, a net loss of nucleosomes from gene-specific regulatory regions increases chromatin accessibility, enables binding of transcriptional regulators, and initiates gene expression. However, the involvement of epigenetic enzymes in the regulation of specific gene expression programs and their genome wide addresses in relation to intrinsic and acquired chemotherapy resistance in pancreatic cancer has yet to be determined. This project will aim to establish how epigenetic enzymes directly engage with the epigenetic platform to contribute to the physiology and pathology of chemoresistance and how regions of the genome become transcriptionally accessible or repressed in response to chemotherapy treatments.

Research Interest

Biomedical discovery for disease prevention and treatment.