February 29^th at 12:00
On-site event
Presidentti auditorium, BioCity
Spring 2024 program

Prof. Juha Klefström, University of Helsinki, Finland
Of MYC, mitochondrial metabolism and death – It’s better to burn out than fade away
Host: Jukka Westermarck (jukwes@utu.fi)

Coffee and sandwich at 11:45, first come first served!

Six PhD researchers and early-career postdocs are welcome to have a lunch in restaurant Mauno and discuss with Prof. Klefström after the seminar. This is a great possibility to learn hosting skills in friendly environment and create connections for future. Everyone is welcome to join, BioCity Turku will offer the lunch.

If you got interested, please send an email to biocityturku@bioscience.fi

Juha Klefström is a FICAN Research Professor in Finnish Cancer Institute, a part time Professor in FICAN-South (HUS) and a part time Research Director in the Translational Cancer Medicine Program, Medical Faculty, University of Helsinki. Klefström is an expert in translational cancer research, breast cancer biology, immuno-oncology, oncogenes and tumor suppressors, cell death, genetically engineered mouse models of breast cancer, mammary gland reconstitution techniques, ex vivo explant cultures and recombinant viral gene transfer methods. Klefström’s research focuses on therapeutic strategies aiming to exploit oncogene-induced vulnerabilities and he has long-term interest in the apoptotic function of MYC protein. Currently, his research group explores the potential of oncogenic MYC in triggering immunogenic death of the tumor cells. Klefström’s research group has established variety of three-dimensional culture systems for mammary primary and stem cell-based organotypic breast structures as well as patient tumor-derived explants for ex vivo target validation and for studies of breast cancer development and translation.

Selected publications

Munne PM, Martikainen L, Räty I, Bertula K, …, Monni O, Pouwels J, Sahu B, Mattson J, Joensuu H, Heikkilä P, Elo LL, Metcalfe C, Junttila MR, Ikkala O, Klefström J. 2021. Compressive stress-mediated p38 activation required for ERα + phenotype in breast cancer. Nat Commun. 2021 Nov 29;12(1):6967. doi: 10.1038/s41467-021-27220-9

Tervonen TA, Pant SM, Belitškin D, Englund JI, Närhi K, Haglund C, Kovanen PE, Verschuren EW, Klefström J. 2021. Oncogenic Ras Disrupts Epithelial Integrity by Activating the Transmembrane Serine Protease Hepsin. Cancer Res. 2021 Mar 15;81(6):1513-1527. doi: 10.1158/0008-5472.CAN-20-1760

Haikala HM, Anttila JM, Marques E, …, Mustjoki S, Kovanen P, Eilers M, Leverson JD, Klefström J. 2019. Pharmacological reactivation of MYC-dependent apoptosis induces susceptibility to anti-PD-1 immunotherapy. Nat Commun. 2019 Feb 6;10(1):620. doi: 10.1038/s41467-019-08541-2

General information

• You can download and save all the spring 2024 FoS-seminars to your calendar from here: https://seafile.utu.fi/d/44a70f80ac1e46a9ad0a/
• Registration is not needed, participation list is circulated in the audience
• If you are a student and later wish to get a certificate of attendance from the Frontier of Science seminars, print out the seminar diary and after the seminar ask the BioCity coordinator to sign it https://seafile.utu.fi/d/44a70f80ac1e46a9ad0a/
• Please note that any audio or video recording of the seminars is strictly forbidden.
• Spring 2024 FoS image credits to Jenny Pessa: Transformed human breast epithelial HS578T cells (flattened), labelled with commercial fluorescent antibodies. Image acquired on 3i CSU-W1 Spinning disk with 40x objective.