Tamara Lah Turnsek

LAH TURN?EK Tamara, PhD, ProfessorNational Institute of Biology Department of Genetic Toxicology and Cancer BiologyVečna pot 111 Ljubljana 1000 Slovenia Tamara Lah Turn?ek was born in Ljubljana, Slovenia. She holds a BS in Organic Chemistry, PhD in Biochemistry , all from the University of Ljubljana. Tamara T. Lah has since 1996 been Director of National Institute of Biology, Ljubljana and Head of Department of genetic toxicology and cancer biology till 2004. She is also Professor of Biochemistry and Molecular biology at University of Ljubljana, teaching Biochemistry of Cancer and giving courses for graduate students of Tumour Biology at Medical Faculty programme Biomedicine. Tamara Lah has started and developed er scientific career at the Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, Josef Stefan Institute in Ljubljana, in 1980-1995. Her professional career outside Slovenia has included the position of Visiting Research Assistant at University of Bonn Germany, Visiting Research Associate, at the University of Newcastle upon Tyne, UK (Fellow of British Council), where she worked on her PhD Thesis in the field of protein biochemistry. She gained her postdoctoral experiences and becoming an Assistant Professor at Department of Pharmacology, School of Medicine, Wayne State University, Detroit Michigan, USA, 1984-1987; from 1991-1994 she was Visiting Professor and Director of Metastasis Research Laboratory, Albert Einstein Medical Centre, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA. Since 2012 she was Guest Prof. at Institute of Chemistry, Sao Paolo University in Brasil. She is also engaged in Science policy, at present the President of Slovenian Council of Scinece and Technology of the Republic of Slovenia. Major achievements in the field.Basic research interests of Prof. Tamara T Lah comprises the role of proteases and their inhibitors in physiological and pathological conditions and in particular in cancer. She contributed mostly to the elucidation of the role of lysosomal enzymes, cathepsins, particular the cysteine cathepsins B, L, S and K, as well as their endogenous inhibitors, in human tumours and tumour cells, such as breast and brain tumours, e.g. gliomas. All these have application in clinics as biomarkers, either in diagnosis, prognosis and as therapy targets. With respect to diagnosis she published several studies which demonstrated that cathepsin B has prognostic value in prognosis of relapse or survival and collaborated with the company KRKA that produced the diagnostic immunoassays. She is also elected member of Pathobiolgy group of European Organisation of Research and Treatment of Cancer (EORTC). In carcinogenesis research, her group published recently on interesting mechanisms of arsenite (Trisenox) treatent of glioblastoma. On the other hand, the chemo preventive, as well as cytotoxic effects of natural flavonoids, such as xanthohumol and resveratrol are the focus of recent research and publications. Recent efforts are focused more on possible use of cathepsins? inhibitors along with chemo therapeutics. As the tumour microenvironment also contributes to cancer progression and related proteolysis, her very recent research is focused on the cross ?talk between tumour and stromal cells, comprising tumour microenvironment. Among them are also the mesenchymal stem cells, which significantly affect tumour behaviour. These cells can also be used for drug toxicity studies. In addition, the research of her group also addressed the cancer stem cell research, investigating their properties and interactions with tumour stroma. Recent Grants and ProjectsInternational: CNPQ ? Science without Borders: The Relevance of Kinin and Related Purinergic Signalling Pathways in Gliobastoma Cells upon Co-culturing with Human Mesenchymal Stem Cells Linha 2 - Bolsa Pesquisador Visitante Especial Edital Nº 61/2011