Andrew Craig’s lab studies proteins in cells that become defective in cancer, specifically those proteins that enable cancer cells to move through different barriers when genetic changes occur in their structure.

Andrew Craig recently received the Canadian Cancer Society’s 2011 Young Investigator Award.

“My research program has really been developed by creative, highly-skilled and motivated students, faculty, and post-doctoral fellows. I look at the award as something to share with all of them,” says Dr. Craig, an associate professor in the Department of Biomedical and Molecular Sciences and member of the Queen’s Cancer Research Institute.

Dr. Craig’s lab studies proteins in cells that become defective in cancer, specifically those proteins that enable cancer cells to move through different barriers when genetic changes occur in their structure. This process allows tumors to spread to other areas of the body, playing a significant factor in mortality rates.

“It is exciting to see Dr. Craig recognized as one of our outstanding scientists,” says Richard Reznick, Dean, Faculty of Health Sciences. “As a colorectal surgeon for 25 years of my career, we were able to cure 60 per cent of the patients that I saw. The other 40 per cent were the different and often tragic group for whom their cancer had already spread, or had the propensity to spread. Dr. Craig’s important work is helping to drive down that 40 per cent.”

The team is using a combination of genetic interventions, focusing on a family of proteins involved in cell movement and looking at ways to prevent the expression of these proteins in cancer cells.

More information about the Canadian Cancer Society’s Young Investigator Award is available here.