Marc. Poirot

Biography

Dr. Marc Poirot is first class research director at the « Institut National de la Santé et de la Recherche Médicale » (INSERM). He heads the team ‘Sterol metabolism and therapeutic innovations in oncology’ at the Cancer Research Center of Toulouse. He received a Ph.D. in Chemical Biology (1991) from the University of Toulouse (France). His research has focused on the elucidation of the molecular mechanism of action of tamoxifen which led to the definition of the importance of cholesterol metabolism in its pharmacology. He studies cholesterol metabolism deregulations in cancers and discovered with his team in 2013 Dendrogenin A: a new tumor suppressor metabolite. Dendrogenin A is the first steroidal alkaloid found to date in mammals, revealing the existence of a metabolic pathway at the crossroad of cholesterol and histamine metabolism. He is co-founder of Affichem, a biotech company that develops small molecules for therapeutic applications.

Research Interest

Tamoxifen,Selective estrogen receptor modulators, breast cancer,estrogen receptor, nuclear receptor, AEBS, cholesterol-5,6-epoxide hydrolase, cholesterol metabolism, zymostenol, 7-dehydrocholesteroloxysterol, cholesterol-5,6-epoxides, 6-oxo-cholestan-3,5-diol, cholesteryl esters, dendrogenin, pharmacology, medicinal chemistry, drug design discovery,lipid metabolism, biomarker, membrane receptors, enzymes, inhibitors, imaging, radiotherapy, cancers, oncogenesis, resistance to drugs, tumor promotor, tumor suppressor, exosome, leukemia, melanoma, neurodegenerative diseases, deafness.