Olga Volpert, PhD Assistant Professor of Urology Molecular mechanisms of angiogenesis inhibitors Curricula: Cancer Biology Molecular Biology and Genetics E-mail:   olgavolp@northwestern.edu

Our laboratory is focused on the studies of angiogenesis, the growth of new capillaries. Many pathological conditions, including cancer and arthritis, depend on angiogenesis for progression. Angiogenesis is controlled by a balance between positive and negative regulators, inducers and inhibitors in the environment of endothelial cells.

When affected by disease, the cells may actively attract new vessels. Some of our studies are focused on the genes that regulate this switch from non-angiogenic, and often inhibitory, to aggressively angiogenic phenotype. Both oncogenes and tumor suppressor genes may be involved in this regulation by increasing secreted angiogenic stimuli and down-regulating inhibitors of aniogenesis. Among such genes are p53, rb, src, and ras.

Natural inhibitors of angiogenesis are powerful tools that may be used to control tumor angiogenesis and therefore hold in check both primary tumors and dormant metastases. We are searching for novel inhibitors as well as trying to understand the molecular mechanisms of action of well known factors such as thrombospondin-1 (TSP-1) and pigment epithelium derived factor (PEDF). We mainly focus on their ability to induce apoptotic cell death in the activated endothelial cells and the common signaling events underlying this effect.

We also work on the interactions of TSP-1 and PEDF with endothelial cells. An anti-angiogenic receptor for TSP-1 is now known, while a search for the receptor for PEDF is in progress.

These studies are aimed at providing new therapies to facilitate treatment of angiogenesis-dependent disease, including cancer.

Publications:

Dawson, D.W., Volpert, O.V., Gillis, P., Crawford, S.E., Xu, H.-J., Benedict, W., and Bouck, N.P. Retinal pigment epithelium-derived factor (PEDF) produced in the eye is a major inhibitor of angiogenesis. Science 285:245-248 (1999)

Jimenez, B., Volpert, O.V., Febbraio, M., Silverstein, R.L., Bouck, N. Signals leading to endothelial cell apoptosis and inhibition of neovascularization by thrombospondin-1. Nature Medicine 6:41-48 (2000)

Zhang, M.,, Volpert, O., Shi, Y.-H. and Bouck., N. Maspin is an angiogenesis inhibitor. Nature Medicine 6:196-199 (2000)

Volpert, O.V. Hematopoiesis and angiogenesis: the same landscape from different points (Editorial). J.Hematotherapy and Stem Cell Res. 9:5-6 (2000)

Volpert O.V. Modulation of endothelial cell survival by an inhibitor of angiogenesis thrombospondin-1: a dynamic balance. Cancer & Metastasis Reviews 19:87-92 (2001).

Jimenez, B., Volpert, O.V. Mechanistic insights on the inhibition of tumor angiogenesis. J. Molecular Medicine 78:663-672 (2001).

View Publications by Olga Volpert listed in the National Library of Medicine (PubMed).