University of Nottingham

Professor David Bates

This small grant was awarded to fund a second year BSc student to work with Professor Bates’s research team at the University of Nottingham for a short period on an existing project.  The student will be undertaking a final year project on cholangiocarcinoma – and in particular on the differential response of EGFR inhibitors on cholangiocarcinomas derived from UK and Thai patients.

The Nottingham team have identified that EGFR is differentially expressed between the Thai and UK groups of patients – it is over-expressed (though apparently not mutated) in 60% of the Thai CCAs derived from patients, compared with those from UK patients.

The team think they have found a subset of patients in which the EGFR inhibitors may well work.  It is this work the student will help with.

It is hoped the eventual outcome of this work would provide supportive data to determine whether CCAs should be screened for EGFR expression/activity before treatment with specific inhibitors.