Dr Keeshan received the President of Ireland Young Researcher Award (PIYRA) in 2008. The PIYRA is Science Foundation Ireland’s most prestigious award and is bestowed to outstanding early career scientists. The PIYRA amounted to almost €1 million which Dr Keeshan has used to establish an active research group in the department of Biochemistry at UCC. Dr Karen Keeshan, originally from Cork, returned to UCC in 2008 after completing postdoctoral work in Thomas Jefferson University, Philadelphia and the University of Pennsylvania.
Dr Keeshan’s research focuses on acute myeloid leukaemia (AML), a common and aggressive form of leukaemia. In particular, Dr Keeshan is interested in a gene called Trib2, which she identified as a cancer causing gene in human. AML is a malignancy that arises in white blood cells and develops when there is a defect in immature immune cells in the bone marrow. In AML, the uncontrolled, exaggerated growth and accumulation of white blood cells leads to anaemia and a deficiency in normal white blood cells resulting in “cancer of the blood”. Dr Keeshan’s research has shown that when the Trib2 gene is expressed in the blood cells, it leads to AML, and can mark a cancer cell in humans. Specifically, Trib2 can degrade other proteins in the blood that act as tumour suppressors. Understanding how these genes function in blood cells and lead to AML is the primary imperative of Dr Keeshan’s research group.
Dr Keeshan’s most recent research is published in the latest issue of the prestigious journal “Blood’, one of the top peer-reviewed journals in this research area. The work defines the regions of the Trib2 gene that are important for leukemia. This is an in depth study that will allow for the design of novel targeting strategies to prevent the function of this gene in AML.
Dr Keeshan has not restricted her research efforts to her UCC-based laboratory however, and since her return to Ireland has become a member of the scientific committee for the Irish Association for Cancer Research and the Irish member of the EU funded European Genetic and Epigenetic Study in AML (COST Action – EuGESMA).
“Although it’s nice to receive some recognition in the media” says Dr Keeshan “ I really feel like I am just getting started and I’m very excited about what the future holds”.
Picture: Dr Karen Keeshan
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