School of Cancer Sciences

She is a Chair in HepatoBiliary Ocnology in the School of Cancer Sciences and holds an honorary contract as Consultant Medical Oncologist at the Beatson West of Scotland Cancer Centre, where she leads the Biliary Cancer Clinic.

Prof Braconi received her MD degree from the University of Ancona in Italy and completed her fellowship in Medical Oncology in 2006. She enrolled in a joint PhD program between the University of Ancona and The Ohio State University, which was followed by post-doctoral training at the Ohio State University, USA. She worked at the University of Glasgow between 2012 and 2014 supported by a Scottish Senior Clinical Research Fellowship, where worked on the role of non-coding RNAs in hepatobiliary cancers. In 2014 she joined the Institute of Cancer Research / Royal Marsden Hospital in London as a clinician scientist where she integrated the study of molecular biology with clinical research to sustain a patient-oriented programme in biliary-pancreatic cancers. Since 2019 she joined the School of Cancer Sciences at the University of Glasgow, where she combines the study of transcriptional and post-transcriptional modifications with patient derived organoids to inform drug discovery and biomarker development. 

She is currently working within national and international consortia (CRUK Scotland Cancer Centre, European Network for the Study of Cholangiocarcinoma, Euro-Cholangio-Net, Cholangiocarcinoma-UK, Precision-BTC, International Cholangiocarcinoma Research Network, McNab Innovation Cancer Centre) to support a collaborative research programme in biliary cancers. 

Dr Rae has been at University of Glasgow since 2009 and joined the HBPO group in 2020.

He is involved in generating organoid models from patient-derived samples which can be used to identify potential targets, testing drug therapies, and developing co-culture models to investigate the involvement of the tumour microenvironment. 

Dr Marco is a postdoctoral researcher in the HBPO group since 2022. He graduated at the Universitat de Barcelona in biochemistry and completed both his MRes and PhD in Neuroscience at the Universitat Autonoma de Barcelona. He completed a first postdoctoral placement at the BCRUK eatson Institute for Cancer Research (Glasgow) where he studied the role of intracellular trafficking of cell receptors in mechanisms of cancer cell invasion.

Dr Marco’s current research comprises the study of the mechanism of action of tumour microenvironment-targeted chemotherapy in cholangiocarcinoma. This work is the result of a partnership between AVACTA, a London-based biotechnology company, and the University of Glasgow. By targeting the tumour microenvironment, and more specifically the cancer-associated fibroblasts, Sergi aims to eliminate the off-target toxicity of conventional chemotherapy, as well as disrupt the supportive cell network around the transformed cholangiocytes.  

Francesco is a PhD candidate within the HPBO group at the Wolfson Wohl Cancer Research Centre. Francesco moved to Glasgow from Italy, where he got his MRes in Molecular Biotechnology at the University of Pisa. 

Francesco is interested in understanding how biliary tract cancer cells communicate with myeloid cells and how the latter helps cancer cells to escape from chemotherapy.  By combining 2D and 3D co-culturing models, patients’ derived samples, and NGS sequencing technologies, he he aims to find potential targets that may be exploited to optimize therapeutic strategies. 

Jack is a CRUK Scotland Centre PhD researcher working within the HPBO group at the Wolfson Wohl Cancer Research Centre. Before this, he gained both his BSc in Biomedical Sciences and  MRes in Medical Sciences from the University of York.

Jack is investigating the mechanism behind the protection from chemotherapy that the body’s own immune system, specifically monocytes, can offer to biliary tract tumours. Following identification of mechanistic targets via next generation sequencing of patient derived monocytes, Jack aims to investigate these targets within a genetically modifiable in vitro co-culture model and a novel in vivo biliary tract cancer model. Better understanding of monocyte chemo-protection within biliary tract cancers will help to improve the use of current chemotherapy and drive novel therapeutic development.