Research area
Treatment of a primary tumor is relatively well established, but limited options are available once brain metastases have established. Patients with melanoma brain metastasis have a poor median overall survival of less than 6 months. Thus, it is very important to develop therapies blocking tumor metastasis into the brain. During metastasis formation, cancer cells use the circulation to reach distant sites. In the brain, the metastasizing cancer cell must breach the tight blood-brain barrier (BBB). In this project, we will investigate the cellular and molecular mechanism enabling metastatic melanoma cells to breach the BBB.