Dr Sharon McKenna graduated from the University of Leicester in 1990 with an Honours Degree in Molecular Biology. She obtained her PhD at the Leukaemia Research Fund Laboratories (LRF), in the University of Wales, College of Medicine, Cardiff, UK 1995. Post-doctoral research was conducted at the LRF Cardiff and the Department of Biochemistry, UCC. Dr. McKenna was appointed Lecturer in Biochemistry, UCC in 1999 and was also group leader of the Signal Transduction Laboratory. In 2002, Dr. McKenna was appointed as a Principal Investigator at the Cork Cancer Research Centre (CCRC). She is currently responsible for the direction of the Autophagy programme at Cancer Research @UCC.

Research

Dr McKenna is a cell biologist with a primary interest in autophagy and its impact on cancer biology. She works on poor prognosis cancers, including oesophageal and ovarian cancer. She also works on Acute Myeloid Leukaemia.

The Autophagy in Cancer group are investigating how autophagy influences chemo-resistance and overall cancer biology.

Funders

Health Research Board 

Breakthrough Cancer Research 

Publications

ORCHID ID 0000-0002-6764-6274