Named Grant:

The ICRF – Redhill Foundation Research Career Development Award

About the Investigator:

Dr. Cohen is an Assistant Professor at Tel Aviv University, where she is head of the Systems Immunology & ImmunoGenomics Laboratory, which specializes in developmental and cancer immunology. She holds an MSc (Summa Cum Laude) from Ben-Gurion University in Tumor Immunology and a PhD in Neuro Immunology from the Weizmann Institute of Science. She carried out postdoctoral training in immunogenomics at the Weizmann Institute and in tumor immunology at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mt. Sinai in New York City.

About the Research:

Communication between cells drives tissue development. At the time of puberty, mammary epithelial and stromal cells interact through specific molecules’ signals to promote normal growth and expansion of the breast tissue. Disruption of this cell communication can drive dysregulation of important processes in the breast tissue and lead to aberrant cell behavior, which may support the initiation, progression, and invasion of breast cancer.

Dr. Cohen’s research will focus on revealing intercellular crosstalk between immune and non-immune cells in cancerous and normal breast tissue, in order to better understand the signaling that preconditions breast cancer development. By applying advanced, single-cell, RNA-sequencing-based technologies, together with novel computational analysis, the Cohen lab will construct a molecular map of single-cell interactions, highlighting and contrasting the signaling that promotes physiological development and breast cancer progression. Initial experiments will use mouse models to identify key molecules, which will be validated using tumor samples derived from patients with different types of breast cancer. These experiments will identify potential targets for treatment with immunotherapy and biomarkers for early-detection of disease.