A protein involved in making cells move offers a clue to how certain types of cancer metastasize and develop into secondary tumors, according to new research from the University of Warwick.

Led by Professor Alfonso Jaramillo in the School of Life Sciences, new research has discovered that a common molecule - ribonucleic acid (RNA), which is produced abundantly by humans, plants and animals - can be genetically engineered to allow scientists to program the actions of a cell.

“Fifteen years ago I had a number of back to back experiences with cancer in my extended family and this was a major trigger for me to want to work in the field of cancer research. My work prior to my personal experiences had nothing to do with cancer, but when we went through these experiences, I knew there were aspects to my work which could be useful and I wanted to try and use my skills in image processing to probe questions in medical and life sciences. I had no track record and it was difficult to get people interested at first. So I used the persistent pursuit tactic – I kept knocking on doors.”

Professor Rajpoot began work involving cancer image analysis and set a couple of PhD students in his lab onto projects within the field. The work snowballed and he founded and is now head of the Tissue Analytics Lab (TIA) within the Computer Sciences department at Warwick.