Bacteria in Human Tumours

Venkata Vamsi Yallapragada

It is becoming apparent that the relationship between humans and bacteria can influence various diseases. Deeper understanding of the bacteria that live in our body is enabling identification of i) potential causes of and ii) potential treatments for disease. The Tangney lab at the Cork Cancer Research Centre has recently discovered that bacteria exist in patient tumours, and are the first to describe a ‘Tumour Microbiome’. A wide range of bacteria was found in all patient breast tumours examined, which varied between patients. It remains unknown if any of these bacteria influence tumour growth, positively or negatively. A better understanding of this phenomenon may facilitate appropriate intervention, diagnosis or prevention strategies. Furthermore, certain bacteria found within tumours could be exploited as natural vehicles to deliver therapeutics to tumours.

Publications:
Yallapragada VVB, Walker SP, Devoy C, Buckley S, Flores Y, Tangney M. Function2Form Bridge-Toward synthetic protein holistic performance prediction. Proteins. 2020 Mar;88(3):462-475. doi: 10.1002/prot.25825. Epub 2019 Oct 29. PMID: 31589780. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/31589780/

Yallapragada VVB, Gowda U, Wong D, O’Faolain L, Tangney M, Devarapu GCR. ODX: A Fitness Tracker-Based Device for Continuous Bacterial Growth Monitoring. Anal Chem. 2019 Oct 1;91(19):12329-12335. doi: 10.1021/acs.analchem.9b02628. Epub 2019 Sep 12. PMID: 31479232.
Copy. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/31479232/

Walker SP, Yallapragada VVB, Tangney M. Arming Yourself for The In Silico Protein Design Revolution. Trends Biotechnol. 2020 Oct 30:S0167-7799(20)30267-5. doi: 10.1016/j.tibtech.2020.10.003. PMID: 33139074.https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/33139074/