Cancer research

Research at the centre considers the different gynaecological cancers: uterine, ovarian/fallopian tube, cervical, and vulval

Women's Cancer Research Centre

In Australia, an estimated 1400 women are diagnosed with ovarian cancer and more than 840 die annually of the disease. This makes ovarian cancer the fourth most common cause of death of women from cancer.  

In the laboratory of Women’s Cancer Research Centre (WCRC) we are seeking to understand how ovarian cancer spread through the surface of the ovaries as well as through circulating tumour cells in ascites.  We are also interested to understand how ovarian cancer cells develop resistance to chemotherapy. These two research areas are being explored by identifying genes and proteins which are over expressed or decreased in samples of patients at different stages of tumour progression. 

We are also identifying differences in the profile of genes and proteins in tumour cells isolated from patients diagnosed with the advanced-stage disease after in vitro manipulation with chemotherapy.