Jean-Philippe LambertPh.D.

Dr. Lambert is a regular researcher at the CHU de Québec-Université Laval Research Center and an assistant professor at the Faculty of Medicine of l’Université Laval in the department of Molecular Medicine. Dr. Lambert’s work aims to decipher how epigenetic regulators are assembled into functional units at the level of chromatin and how they impact transcription in healthy and cancerous cells. To address these fundamental questions, Dr. Lambert employs a multidisciplinary approach that includes mass spectrometry-based proteomics, protein biochemistry and cancer biology. He was recently awarded a prestigious Scholarship for the Next Generation of Scientists from the Cancer Research Society to support him as he establishes his research program.

Characterization of bromodomain-containing proteins in hormone-responsive cancers

Bromodomain-containing proteins are epigenetic regulators involved in many facets of the transcription process. Recently, numerous bromodomain inhibitors have been developed enabling the modulation of their activity for therapeutic benefit. Dr. Lambert’s group is currently investigating the functions of bromodomain-containing proteins in the context of hormone-responsive breast cancers to define their physical interplay with hormone receptors. In addition, Dr. Lambert is defining how specific cancer contexts impinged on bromodomain-containing proteins function and whether they generate actionable vulnerabilities that can targeted with bromodomain inhibitors.

Development of innovative functional proteomics technologies

To enable functional studies of epigenetic regulators, Dr. Lambert’s group is developing and implementing novel proteomics technologies to enable the study of proteomes, protein-protein interactions and post-translational modifications from clinically relevant samples. A particular focus of Dr. Lambert’s efforts remains the study of protein complexes associated with chromatin allowing the elucidation of the mechanisms enabling the ordered recruitment of epigenetic regulators to particular genomic loci.