Bioinformatics Unit Winter-Spring Webinars | 2 - M. Tommasino - International Agency for Research on Cancer: Role of infections in carcinogenesis
The Department of Clinical and Experimental Medicine (Bioinformatics Unit) runs a series of Webinar involving renowned scientists and researchers focusing on algorithms, models, biomedical and biotechnological techniques and clinical studies and applications. The webinars are coordinated by Prof. Alfredo Pulvirenti and will be freely accessed through the MS Teams Platform starting February 2021. The second Webinar is scheduled for: February 23, 2021, 3 pm
Title: Role of infections in carcinogenesis
Speaker: Dr. Massimo Tommasino, International Agency for Research on Cancer
MS Teams Link: Click here to join the meeting
Abstract: Infectious agents represent a major group of risk factors for cancer development and contribute to about 15% of human cancers worldwide. Six viruses and one bacterium, i.e. human papillomavirus (HPV), hepatitis C virus (HCV), hepatitis B virus, Human T-lymphotropic virus type I (HTLV-1), Epstein-Barr virus (EBV), Kaposi sarcoma-associated virus (KSHV) and Helicobacter pylori, have been clearly associated with human carcinogenesis.
The mucosal high-risk (HR) HPV types are the etiological factors of cervical cancers and sub-set of oropharyngeal cancers. In addition, ongoing studies concerning a sub-group of HPV types that infect the skin suggest their involvement, together with ultraviolet radiation (or solar exposure), in the development of non-melanoma skin cancer (NMSC). Biological studies have demonstrated that the products of two early genes from the HR HPV types, E6 and E7, play a key role in cancer development. Both viral oncoproteins are able to target several cellular pathways leading to the evasion of the immune surveillance and cellular transformation. These studies also substantially contributed to our understanding of key mechanisms involved in the normal life of the cell. In the last few years, we have performed additional studies on cutaneous and mucosal HPV types and have characterized novel oncogenic viral mechanisms involved in the evasion of the immune response and/or in cellular transformation. A few examples will be presented.