Denis Guttridge, Ph.D.

I am a professor in the Medical University of South Carolina (MUSC) Department of Pediatrics and the Director of the Darby Children’s Research Institute. I also serve as the Hollings Cancer Center (HCC) Associate Director of Translational Science. I served as the HCC interim leader, 2020-2021. My laboratory is focused on the NF-kB signaling pathway and the regulation of cell growth and cellular differentiation. My familiarity with NF-kB extends 20 years, beginning with postdoctoral training at the University of North Carolina, at Chapel Hill and continuing in my own research group at the Ohio State University and more recently at MUSC. The goal of our laboratory is to understand whether NF-kB regulation of differentiation is relevant in tumorigenesis. To study this property of NF-kB, we utilize skeletal muscle as a model system of differentiation. In vitro and in vivo genetic approaches have provided insight on the function of NF-kB in myogenesis, which led us to understanding the contribution of this signaling pathway in the cancer cachexia syndrome, characterized by extreme weight loss due to skeletal muscle wasting, and other muscle related disorders such as the childhood cancer, rhabdomyosarcoma, and Duchenne muscular dystrophy. Given that cancer cachexia is highly prevalent in patients with pancreatic cancer, and NF-kB is tied to the development of pancreatic cancer, my laboratory also has a strong interest in understanding the link between NF-kB function in pancreatic cancer and cachexia. We are currently pursuing different avenues of investigation as well as therapeutics for the treatment of pancreatic cancer and other skeletal muscle related disorders.