Protein Kinase C and D signalling in health and disease

Dr. Michael Leitges
Canada Research Chair in Cell Signaling and Translational Medicine
Faculty of Medicine 

Date: January 23, 2023
Time: 1:00 p.m. to 2:00 p.m. 
Room: CSF 1302

For more than 2 decades I am interested in the identification and further characterization of in vivo signalling mechanisms mediated by individual members of the Protein Kinase C protein family. These kinases represent multi-functional proteins which have been described as signal mediators of virtually every membrane receptor system described in mammalian cells. Based on this central position PKC’s have been connected to many disease related molecular signalling pathway associated with, for example diabetes, neurological disorders, endothelium dysfunctions and many more. Due to the fact that PKCs also become activated by the action of tumor-promoting agents (TPA) this family has been linked to tumor initiation and progression as well. One focus of our work is to unravel details behind these cancer inducing signalling pathways in order to understand the molecular mechanism which later can be used as a target to develop more specific drugs for either cancer treatment but also prevention. 

Within recent years a PKC/PKD signalling axis has been established in that context and also represents our current focus in the lab.