Shaye Game, Elliot Gautsch Scholar - funded by Isabella and Marcus Foundation

I chose Developmental and Cancer Biology Research group at Hudson Institute because in my undergraduate degree I developed a strong interest in epigenetics’, neuro-development and oncology. Therefore, the combination of a project targeting epigenetic dysregulation in a paediatric brain cancer was a great fit and completely aligned with my interests. I also had previously undertaken my Honours year at Developmental and Cancer Biology, Hudson Institute and knew it was an encouraging and supportive group in which I wanted to continue my PhD in.

Diffuse intrinsic pontine glioma (DIPG) is a devastating and fatal paediatric high-grade glioma that develops in the pons of the brain stem. Next generation sequencing has revealed ~80% of DIPG tumours exhibit an exclusive and highly recurrent heterozygous mutation in genes encoding histone variants, H3.3 (H3F3A) and H3.1 (HIST1H3B and HIST1H3C), resulting in lysine to methionine substitution (H3K27M) and is essential for epigenetic control of gene expression during development. The project hopes to investigate the precise impact of H3K27M and subsequent epigenetic dysregulation on DIPG tumorigenesis to identify novel therapeutic opportunities.

It is hoped that the research I conduct on DIPG enhances our understanding of H3K27M and subsequent epigenetic dysregulation in disease progression that will hopefully lead to the discovery of new therapeutic inventions that could ultimately improve patient outcomes.