Eccellenze della ricerca italiana: Carlo Croce, George Calin, Manuela Ferracin

 Oggi mi sono collegato ad un webinar interessante, (per problemi di virus, hanno doovuto interrompere) organizzato dal Journal of Translational Genetics and Genomics: MicroRNAs and Long Non-coding RNAs in Genetic Diseases

webinar tenuto da due eccellenze della ricerca prestati agli USA, Carlo Croce, del Dipartimento di biologia dei tumori dell'Ohio State University, Columbus, e da George A. Calin, di origini rumene, che ha studiato presso l'univeristà di Ferrara per il dottorato, ed oggi lavora al Department of Translational Molecular Pathology, Division of Pathology/Lab Medicine, The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston. Interverrà anche l'italianissima Manuela Ferracin, del gruppo di Massimo Negrini, e professoressa all'università di Bologna. 

E' rimarchevole l'ottima qualità delle loro pubblicazioni, e il ranking, ossia l'indice H che hanno raggiunto

Prof. George Calin is  Professor of Department of Translational Molecular Pathology, Division of Pathology/Lab Medicine, The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center; Co-Director, The RNA Interference and non-codingRNA Center, The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center; Co-Director, MD/PhD Program, The University of Texas, Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences. Prof. Calin was the first to discover the link between human cancers and microRNAs, a finding considered as a milestone in microRNA research history. He has now developed starting from July 2007 an independent research group at the M.D. Anderson Cancer Center in Houston and produced a new advance by linking new classes of non-coding RNAs to cancer. He is presently a Professor in Department of Translational Molecular Pathology at MDACC and studies the roles of microRNAs and other non-coding RNAs in cancer initiation and progression and in immune disorders, as well as the mechanisms of cancer predisposition linked to ncRNAs. Furthermore, he explores the roles of body fluids miRNAs as potential hormones and biomarkers, as well as new RNA therapeutic options for cancer patients. He has published over 600 scientific articles in prestigious journals, has been cited over 139,000 times (Google Scholar) and has received numerous awards and honors for his groundbreaking work in cancer research. He is the Highly Cited Researcher in the field of Clinical Medicine, ASCI Membership, American Society for Clinical Investigation, etc.

Prof. Croce is the John W. Wolfe Chair in Human Cancer Genetics, The Ohio State University; Member of The National Academy of Sciences, the National Academy of Medicine, the Institute of Medicine of the National Academies, and the National Academy of Inventors; Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

Prof. Croce is an Italian-American molecular geneticist and professor of medicine at Ohio State University. Renowned for his investigations of cancer pathogenesis, Prof. Croce has provided valuable insights into the underlying, genetic basis of cancer onset. His research has established genetic links to a variety of cancers including Burkitt's lymphoma, T-Cell lymphoma, and acute leukemia. He is a pioneer in the unraveling of the molecular basis of a number of lymphoma and leukemia cancers. In addition to his studies involving genes such as ALL1 and TCL1, Prof. Croce was the first investigator to discover and sequence BCL2. He later defined a role for this protein in various lymphomas such as follicular lymphoma. More recently, Prof. Croce's work has centered on understanding the role of micro RNAs in cancer pathogenesis. His research has proved that particular micro RNAs have the potential to exhibit either oncogenic or tumor suppressive properties. He has published over 1000 research papers and has been cited over 270,000 times (Google Scholar), making him one of the most highly cited researchers in the world.

Prof. Croce has received numerous awards and honors for his contributions to cancer research, including Charles S. Mott Prize from the General Motors Cancer Research Foundation (1993), the Scientific Excellence in Medicine Award from the American-Italian Cancer Foundation (1997), the Honor of Merit of Italian Republic (2000), the Henry M. Stratton Medal by the American Society of Hematology (2007), the Outstanding Investigator Award from the National Cancer Institute (2015); the Margaret Foti Award (2017), etc.

Dr. Ferracin is the Associate Professor, Department of Medical and Surgical Sciences, University of Bologna, Bologna, Italy.

Dr. Ferracin has a strong background in molecular oncology, with a specific expertise in the identification of diagnostic or prognostic gene signatures. As a PhD student in Prof. Negrini's lab, she collaborated with Prof. George Calin and Prof. Carlo Croce, when they published the first papers showing an association between microRNAs and cancer. They developed the first microarray for microRNA expression analysis. She applied this novel technology to the discovery of microRNAs and non-coding RNAs involved in leukemia, breast cancer and other solid tumors (PNAS, 2004; NEJM, 2005; CancerCell, 2007). In 2012, she obtained the prestigious "My First AIRC Grant" to study circulating microRNAs in biological fluids of cancer patients. She identified cancer-specific signatures of cell-free microRNAs for cancer diagnosis. Following her recruitment as Professor at the University of Bologna in 2016, she established her independent research group and obtained a grant as PI from Bologna University (Almaidea), to study methylation alteration in stage II colorectal cancer (CancerLett, 2018). She is currently working on the identification of melanoma prognostic biomarkers and the development of patient-derived cancer models.

Ai tempi d'oro della ricerca sui microRNAs, gli studi di espressione mediante DNA arrays si facevano fare negli USA, presso il laboratorio pionieristico, tramite questi contatti e conoscenze. Anche il mio amico Massimo Mallardo, titolare di un progetto per giovani ricercatori del VI programma quadro EU, aveva svolto uno studio su miR-7a, e sul differenziamento di linee leucemiche mediante ATRA, acido retinoico. Nel 2003 avevamo iniziato il progetto STREP della EU dal titolo RIBOREG "Novel roles od non-coding RNAs in development and disease", in questa occasione abbiamo unito le forze con Massimo Mallardo, per portare insieme i nostri risultati al meeting di conclusio del progetto e  insieme Trans-project meeting sugli RNA della Commissione Europea, nel 2007, a Carry Le Rouet. Una review fu sottomessa al giornale dell'ospedale Regina Elena, Journal of Experimental Clinical Cancer Research, valutato dal gruppo americano di editors, che però vide la luce solo nel 2008 quando il giornale entrò nella lista di riviste con impact factor di Scopus. 

Mallardo M, Poltronieri P, D'Urso OF. Non-protein coding RNA biomarkers and differential expression in cancers: a review. J Exp Clin Cancer Res. 2008 Jul 16;27(1):19.

Il lavoro sulle linee leucemiche differenziate con Acido Retinoico uscì nel 2010, con la partecipazione di Manuela Ferracin.

Rossi A, D'Urso OF, Gatto G, Poltronieri P, Ferracin M, Remondelli P, Negrini M, Caporaso MG, Bonatti S, Mallardo M. Non-coding RNAs change their expression profile after Retinoid induced differentiation of the promyelocytic cell line NB4. BMC Res Notes. 2010 Jan 27;3:24.

Con George Calin abbiamo pubblicato due grosse review, di cui sono l'autore principale nel senso di colui che la ha scritte, 

Farooqi AA, Fuentes-Mattei E, Fayyaz S, Raj P, Goblirsch M, Poltronieri P, Calin GA. Interplay between epigenetic abnormalities and deregulated expression of microRNAs in cancer. Semin Cancer Biol. 2019 Oct;58:47-55.

Farooqi AA, Fayyaz S, Poltronieri P, Calin G, Mallardo M. Epigenetic deregulation in cancer: Enzyme players and non-coding RNAs. Semin Cancer Biol. 2022 Aug;83:197-207

Già nel 2015 ci eravamo sentiti per uno special issue sul giornale Current Genomics, di cui ero guest editor, e inviarono contributi sia Sonia Melo, del gruppo di George Calin

EDITORIAL Implication of Non-coding RNAs in Cancer Biology and Cellular Physiology. Palmiro Poltronieri. Curr Genomics. 2015 Oct; 16(5): 294. 

Silva M, Melo SA. Non-coding RNAs in Exosomes: New Players in Cancer Biology. Curr Genomics. 2015 Oct;16(5):295-303

sia Maria Ciccone, George Adrian Calin MicroRNAs in Myeloid Hematological Malignancies. Curr Genomics. 2015 Oct; 16(5): 336–348. 

nel 2016 ancora guest editor, per MicroRNAs, ho reclutato di loro per raccolgiere alla fine sei contributi

"This special issue intends to bring an update on microRNA topics, presenting six contributions. Massimo Mallardo discusses the role of miR-25 and its targeted genes in development of human cancer. Maria Ciccone and George Calin review the findings on microRNAs in chronic lympocytic leukemia. Charles Lawrie reviews the links between deregulated expression of microRNAs and B-cell lymphomas. Binlian Sun contributes with a review on the role of microRNAs in HIV-1 replication and latency. Xiao-Min Leng reviews several cases of miRNA-dependent activation of mRNA translation. Finally, Marek Sanak introduces new data on miR-29c-3p as a biomarker of abdominal aortic aneurysm, in patients undergoing elective surgery". MicroRNA, 2016, Vol. 5, No. 2