Anne-Katrine Frank

PhD student


Key Research Interests
- C/EBP-alpha in normal hematopoiesis and leukemia
- Hematopoietic stem cells
- Acute Myeloid Leukemia

Current Project
Acute Myeloid Leukemia (AML) is a hematopoietic malignancy associated with poor prognosis, which manifests itself by rapid accumulation of abnormal immature myeloid cell populations in the bone marrow, the peripheral blood and various non-hematopoietic organs of the patient. In around 10% of de novo AML cases, mutations in the transcription factor C/EBP-alpha is found. C/EBP-alpha is implicated in late differentiation events in numerous tissues including the hematopoietic system, where it is lineage instructive in the differentiation of neutrophilic granulocytes. As a consequence, C/EBP-alpha deficiency results in a differentiation block upstream of the bipotential granulocyte macrophage progenitor (GMP) population.
In our lab we have a murine model, the Lp30 model, mimicking one of the most common C/EBP-alpha mutations found in patients. This model develops AML with clinical features of the human conditions within the first year of its life span, thereby providing a precise model for the subtype of human AML with mutations in CEBPA.
This model enables us to study the leukemic progression. The goal of my Ph.d project is to identify novel determinants governing this process. I use a range of different assays in the search for factors specific for the cells maintaining the leukemia, the leukemia initiating cells. This will hopefully provide potential therapeutic targets and new insights into the mechanisms involved in the disease development.


Career
2011- : Ph.d. student in Bo Porses research group at the Finsen Laboratory.
2010-11: Research assistant in Bo Porse’s group at BRIC / Laboratory of Gene Therapy Research, Rigshospitalet, University of Copenhagen.
2010: Masters degree in Molecular Biomedicine, University of Copenhagen
2007-08: Exchange student at Australian National University.