School of Science Division of Life Science 21 Human Complex Disease Genomics and Bioinformatics Supervisor: LIANG Chun / LIFS Co-supervisor: XUE Hong / LIFS Student: WEN Ching Man / BCB Course: UROP 1000, Summer The development of cancer is a complex process driven by genetic variations within the genome. Understanding the relationship between genomic changes and cancer development is important for improving diagnostic, prognostic, and therapeutic approaches. This study aimed to investigate the genomic profiles of lung cancer by analyzing and comparing DNA extracted from lung tumor tissues and blood samples using the AluScan technique. The DNA library for next-generation sequencing (NGS) was constructed using a workflow including DNA extraction, inter-Alu PCR, fragmentation, size selection, end repairing, adaptor ligation, and index addition. A total of 20 tissue samples and 6 blood samples had a final DNA concentration greater than the minimum 7.0 ng/µl required for the subsequent NGS process. Human Complex Disease Genomics and Bioinformatics Supervisor: LIANG Chun / LIFS Co-supervisor: XUE Hong / LIFS Student: WO Hui Cheuk / BIBU Course: UROP 1100, Summer By making use of millions of Alu elements in the human genome, DNA sequences of the patients’ tumors can be amplified and investigated. Through the DNA sequencing of them, cancer genomics is studied in this project. The methodology from DNA extraction, Inter-Alu PCR to DNA purification is introduced with explanations of each step. The purified DNA is prepared for next-generation sequencing and the resulting sequences are analyzed. Bioinformatics is exhibited by using a Linux program to compare the resulting DNA sequence with the human genome. The importance of genomics to cancer therapy and the future of new cancer drugs are discussed. Potential Cancer Drug Identification and Characterization Supervisor: LIANG Chun / LIFS Student: SILVA Paolo Mendoza / BIBU Course: UROP 1100, Fall The battle against cancer is a long-standing challenge that humanity has struggled with since the dawn of medicine and is becoming increasingly more important as our populations continue to age increasing the proportion of those affected. It’s nature to rise from random mutations makes them tricky to fight as they can come from all cell types; those mutations may differ from case to case and their origin as human cells can make medicine for cancer cells toxic to normal cells as well. Regardless of a treatment’s effectiveness against cancer cells if it causes great harm to the patient, it is far from an ideal outcome and there is great room for improvement. For example, chemotherapy one of the more prevalent treatments for cancer worldwide is very nonselective in its effects, it has plenty of very debilitating side effects, a compromised immune system, hair loss, extreme nausea, and many more. This is an update report on a study of a novel anti-cancer drug called NJ4.
RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy NDk5Njg=