Research Interest

Inflammation is an organism’s protective mechanism to cope with the altered cellular environment, trauma, injury and/or infection. While acute inflammation (which is resolved quickly) has many beneficial effects, chronic inflammation is a serious problem and leads to many pathophysiological conditions. Major focus of my research has been the elucidation of the molecular events associated with amyloidosis, arthritis, atherosclerosis and cancer, all of which are results of abnormal gene expression during persistent and chronic inflammation.  My current research involve studies on the proliferation, metastasis and recurrence of breast cancer.  I have been focusing on several regulatory factors that are crucial in angiogenesis and particularly in the angiogenic switch.  Since tumor dormancy involves angiogenic suppression and cancer recurrence is triggered by angiogenic switch with re-initiation of angiogenesis, my research focuses on these two events.  In another project, I am investigating the contribution of complex epigenetic processes involving various transcriptional regulators and DNA conformation, such as Z-DNA structure, in the regulation of genes including several proteases that are associated with metastasis.  Also, I am working on the role of oncogene Ras in regulating angiogenesis in breast cancer. My goal is to develop new therapeutic measure against tumor angiogenesis to control tumor cell dormancy and prevent cancer recurrence and metastasis.