Q&A with Dr. Mélanie Uguen: Exploring a Promising Drug Target for Cancer

Abnormal gene expression — the process by which instructions in our DNA are converted into proteins — is linked with disease development, especially cancer.

Mélanie Uguen, PhD, of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill received a 2023 PhRMA Foundation Postdoctoral Fellowship in Drug Discovery for her work to exploring multiple strategies to develop a drug targeting SETDB1, a protein involved in the gene expression process.

Uguen hopes one of these strategies will lead to the discovery of the first drug able to prevent SETDB1 from abnormally reducing the accessibility of DNA for gene expression.

Watch this video to learn about Uguen and her research.