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Department of Biochemistry

 
Jackson Group

We are delighted to announce that the Jackson Group has been awarded two new grants from Cancer Research UK and the British Heart Foundation. These awards will enable their ground-breaking research targeting voltage-gated sodium channels in a variety of cancers, including breast cancer, as well as pharmacological interrogation of a range of small molecules to inform future drug design and repurposing for cardiac rhythm disorders. 

We would also like to congratulate Samantha Salvage on her well-deserved promotion to Senior Research Associate.

CRUK – Early Detection and Diagnosis Primer Award
Samantha Salvage, Tony Jackson and Samir Hamaia, in collaboration with a team at the University of York have been awarded primer funding from CRUK to develop human fragment antibodies targeting a voltage-gated sodium channel as an early oncogenic biomarker in breast cancer. This channel has been identified in a variety of cancers, most notably breast including triple negative breast (TNBC) cancer which lacks the key receptors commonly targeted by therapeutic regimes. They will select a variety of single chain variable fragment antibodies targeting a unique epitope on this biomarker and then screen them to identify the most selective and high affinity binders for development into an early detection and diagnostic tool for screening a variety of cancers including TNBC.  

BHF – Project grant
Tony Jackson and Samantha Salvage, in collaboration with Taufiq Rahman in the Department of Pharmacology have been awarded BHF funding to investigate the molecular pharmacology of a family of small molecules indicated in the treatment of a broad range of cardiovascular and neurological indications with ‘off-target’ effects on the cardiac voltage-gated sodium channel, Nav1.5. These effects are contrastingly pro- or anti-arrhythmic depending on the underlying patient history. Therefore, a deeper understanding of the mechanism of action is necessary to tailor a personalised approach achieving the most efficacious outcome and reducing the necessity for trial-and-error in drug prescription for these conditions. Furthermore, structural insights from Cryo-EM will inform future drug design and repurposing. 
 

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Samir Hamaia, Samantha Salvage, and Tony Jackson (Department of Biochemistry)

Publication date

19 February 2025