Catrin Pritchard

Personal Details

Deputy Director of Leicester Cancer Research Centre

Tel: 0116 229 7061

Email: cap8@le.ac.uk

Career

• 1983-1987: PhD at the Imperial Cancer Research Fund.
• 1987-1990: Postdoctoral Fellow, University of California, San Francisco, USA.
• 1991-1995: Postdoctoral Fellow, DNAX Research Institute, Palo Alto, California, USA.
• 1995-2003: Royal Society Research University Research Fellow, University of Leicester.
• 2003-2004: Lecturer, Department of Biochemistry, University of Leicester.
• 2004-2009: Reader, Department of Biochemistry, University of Leicester.
• 2009: Professor of Cancer Biochemistry, University of Leicester.
• 2010-2015: Royal Society-Wolfson Research Merit Award Holder
• 2014-2017: Science Director Cancer Research UK Leicester Centre
• 2014-2018: Head of Leicester Cancer Research Centre, University of Leicester
• 2018-present Deputy Director Cancer Research Centre, University of Leicester

Publications

Recent publications (since 2010)

Research

Signal transduction through the RAF-MEK-ERK pathway

•  Feedback control of the RAF-MEK-ERK pathway in normal and cancer cells.
• Subcellular localisation of wild-type and oncogenic RAF isoforms.
• Role of phosphorylation in control of RAF activity and RAF protein stability.

RAS and RAF-driven tumour development

• RAS and RAF conditional knockin mouse models for modeling human cancer initiation and progression focusing on lung adenocarcinoma and colorectal cancer models.
• Investigation of the role of Glycogen Synthase Kinase 3 (GSK3) in ^V600EBRAF-driven colorectal cancer development using mouse models.
• Characterisation of the microenvironment of premalignant lesions driven in the lung using mouse models and human tumour tissue microarrays.
• Cholesterol metabolism in tumour associated macrophages (TAMs) and targeting of TAMs by cholesterol modulating agents.

Novel ex vivo tumour explant platform for drug discovery and development

• Optimisation of conditions for ex vivo tumour explant culture for a range of human cancers
• Application of digital pathology to the characterisation and quantitation of tumour explant drug responses.
• Derivation of patient-relevant data on drug responses correlated with predictive and pharmacodynamic biomarkers.
• Collaborations and contracts with commercial partners to extend the application of the explant platform to the drug development pipeline.