Meet-a-PI Scientist Profile
Meet-a-PI Scientist Profile
Name: Christie Towers
Hometown: Denver, Colorado
Hobbies: Skiing, baking, spending time outdoors
Lab: Towers Lab
Lab website: https://towers.salk.edu
What do you study? We want to understand how cancer cells recycle their own nutrients to survive. Some cancer cells are very dependent on these kinds of metabolic recycling processes and clinical trials are underway to block this cellular recycling in order to kill cancer cells. But we discovered that some cancer cells can get around these blockades and become drug resistant. Now we are using cell biology techniques like high resolution microscopes and gene editing to understand and prevent cancer cells from evading these drugs – all with the goal of making better cancer killing therapeutics.
Why is it important? Cancer is extremely cunning, and it has found a way to evade almost all the drugs we have thrown at it in the past 50 years. As clinical trials move forward with drugs designed to target cellular recycling, we must try to predict how the cancer cells can become resistant and identify drug combinations that are more effective at killing cancer cells.
What piqued your interest in science? In the second grade I was assigned a project about the ocean. While I first fell in love with science back then, my interests have changed over the years from wanting to be a marine biologist, then a physician, and ultimately pursuing a career in cancer research.
What do you like about being a scientist? I love asking questions. That’s all science is…asking one question that usually leads to a partial answer and then five more questions. There is always another question to dig deeper and it’s so fascinating and fun to just keep digging!
What are 5 general vocabulary terms someone should know going into your field of science?
Cancer, metabolism, gene editing, drug resistance and relapse.
What are 5 specific vocabulary terms someone should know about your research?
Autophagy, mitochondria, CRISPR/Cas9, mitochondrial-derived vesicles and genetically engineered mouse models.
