Dr Maria Alcolea

Biography

In 2007 Maria received her PhD in Biochemistry at the University of the Balearic Islands, Spain. She then moved to Barts Cancer Institute - Queen Mary University of London to start her Postdoctoral training with Dr. P.R. Cutillas, where she used phosphoproteomic approaches to study cancer drug resistance. In 2009 she joined Prof Phil Jones laboratory at the Hutchison/MRC cancer unit where she was awarded a Marie Curie Intra-European Fellowship (FP7). There she spent a total of 6 years studying epithelial stem cell behaviour using genetic lineage tracing approaches and methods from statistical physics.

Research Interest

My research interests have been focused on studying the behaviour of progenitor cells in the mouse oesophagus as a model to unveil the basic rules underlying squamous epithelial cell fate. My work in the field has revealed how this tissue is maintained under homeostatic conditions, and how these rules switch upon injury.