General Description

The technology of cellular reprogramming from the stem cell field offers a novel method to investigate the neuroendocrine tumor (NET) biology. We hypothesize that new insights will be gained by reprogramming cellular identity of both normal and tumor cells by forcibly expressing a correct set of transcription factors, genes that turn on or off other genes. Such change in cellular identity could result in transdifferentiation where one cell lineage type changes to another or in dedifferentiation where cells acquire potential to become many different cell types, similar to stem cells. Broadly, we propose to investigate the biology of endocrine cells and their counterpart NET cells by inducing transdifferentiation or dedifferentiation