and PostDocs

I welcome motivated PhD students and PostDocs with a biological science background who are interested in cancer biology and drug discovery. If you would like to apply for a scholarship to join my lab please contact me well in advance.

Tumours are composed of cancerous and normal stromal cells that are recruited to the site to sustain malignant growth. The research of my lab focuses on how these non-cancerous stromal cells, particularly fibroblasts, and the extracellular matrix they deposit, interact and promote cancer progression and therapeutic responses.

In this context we aim to understand how therapies, such as chemotherapies in cancer patients and immunosuppressive therapies in transplant patients, impact tissue homeostasis and support the formation of primary and secondary cancers and the initiation of metachronous cancers, which are independent from the original primary cancer. One of our research projects focuses for example on the underlying mechanisms of chemotherapy-induced fibrosis. We also ask the timely question how fibroblasts impact immune cell infiltration and tumour cell killing and consequently the anticancer activity of novel immunotherapies. To achieve this we combine cancer and metastasis models with in vitro 2D/3D co-culture systems. 

A second stream of our research investigates, through local and international collaborations, the anticancer activity of novel anticancer compounds (including plant-based compounds, fragment-based screening) and the biocompatibility of novel biomaterials.

Overall, we aim to identify novel strategies to target the tumour and/or stroma for the prevention or suppression of metastatic cancer and to overcome treatment-resistant tumour progression focusing on the role of normal and cancer-associated fibroblasts.

Current lab members:

Ioanna Kontou (PhD student)

Tressan Grant (PhD student)

Ella Rimmer (PhD stduent together with Prof Tosh)

Former lab members:

PhD students:
Emily Lay (Oct 2019-Aug 2023)
Carmen Grimaldos Rodriguez (Nov 2018-Mar 2023, together with Prof Tosh)

MSc students:
Uliana Filie (MSc Molecular Biosciences 2023), Amalda Erdmane (MSc Molecular Biosciences 2023), Spyroula Antoniou (MSc Drug Discovery, 2021), Shujun Wang (MSc Drug Discovery, 2020)

BSc final year students:
Victoria Summers (BSc Biochem, 2022/23), Sophie Bliss (BSc Biochem, 2022/23), Honor Tookey (BSc Biochem, 2022/23), Laura Edwards (BSc BiomedSci, 2021/22), Sabrina James (BSc BiomedSci, 2021/22), Mari Davies (BSc BiomedSci, 2019/20), Meryl Attrill (BSc BiomedSci, final 2019/20) 

ERASMUS visiting students:
Simone Herwig (2022), Anna Lauridsen (2018/19)

Biography

Dr Ute Jungwirth holds a master’s degree (Magistra rerum naturalium) in Chemistry from the University Vienna and in Toxicology (MScTox) from the Medical University Vienna. She carried out her PhD at the Institute of Cancer Research at the Medical University Vienna (Austria) in the group of Professor Walter Berger. In 2013 she was awarded a Schrödinger Fellowship from the Austrian Science Fund to join the Institute of Cancer Research ICR London (UK) and work together with Professor Clare Isacke. Her research focused on the metastasis-promoting role of cancer-associated fibroblasts and the collagen receptor Endo180.  She developed a syngeneic, spontaneously metastasising breast cancer in vivo model 

Dr Ute Jungwirth is Chair of the Cancer Research at Bath CR@B committee and network and member of the Centre of Therapeutic Innovations CTI at the Unviersity of Bath.