@Westermarcklab

Skiteam #CIP2A demonstrated admirable attitude and performance on yesterday´s training session. Some of the bravest with training background from the past years already approached the 3 km track with up and downhills. #lifeinfinland @westermarcklab.bsky.social #lifeoutsidethelab

Registration is now OPEN for the cancer research community to join us for the #EACR2026 Congress! 🥳

Don't miss the opportunity to take advantage of our discounted early registration rate to attend, available until 21 April.

2026.eacr.org

Santa Claus paid a surprise visit to our last lab development meeting and brought nice @westermarcklab.bsky.social mugs as a gift to everyone, also to the naughty boy.
With these images we wish everyone happy holidays and merry Christmas.

We have a group leader position open surrounded by fantastic core facilities and great science @turkubioscience.bsky.social.

Farewell to @muksha.bsky.social. a proud recipient of the first @westermarcklab mug. Huge thanks for all your contributions and best of luck on your new adventures @mdanderson.bsky.social

Great fun yesterday celebrating the recent Tillandz prize with the lab and collaborators. Also remotely joining the man of the hour, Majid Momeny aka the first author of the paper.

@srikarnagelli.bsky.social back on the crime scene. Always good to have alumni visiting the lab and sharing their new knowledge

Congrats @shrutibhardiya.bsky.social @westermarcklab.bsky.social for winning the best poster prize at 7th @fibtra.bsky.social annual Brain Tumor meeting. Excellent meeting, thanks to all organisers 💪

Very exciting talk by Alberto Ballestin on acute impact of surgery on glioblastoma tissue @fibtra.bsky.social annual symposium in Turku.

2/2 These results potentially facilitate development of CIP2A inhibitor molecules for therapies in #BRCA mutant cancers, other CIP2A-dependent cancers and in #Alzheimer disease. Very exciting collaboration with groups of Olli Pentikäinen and Ulla Pentikäinen and led by Karolina Pavic.

Modulation of CIP2A dimerization and protein stability via druggable pocket Cancerous inhibitor of PP2A (CIP2A) supports malignant growth across several cancer types. CIP2A is also a synthetic lethal therapy target for BRCA-mutant cancers. In addition, CIP2A causes Alzheimer'...

#CIP2A has a druggable pocket. I am thrilled to announce that the last of my #CIP2A bucket list items, established 2007 has finally been accomplished. The work now out in BioRxiv reports a small molecule druggable pocket on CIP2A
1/2 www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

Have you heard of #CIP2A, a hot new kid on the block of genome integrity and DNA repair?
Funny enough, most of these papers hardly mention CIP2A as PP2A inhibitor covered by about 400 papers. This is really exciting developments for sure, an eventually these oncogenic arms of CIP2A will merge.

#careergoals after all these years I was finally rewarded by a whiteboard in my office.😁 Had to start using it immediately.

Elias Tillandz Prize awarded at the BioCity Symposium to scientific publications on breast cancer recurrence and cancer gene overactivation The Elias Tillandz prize for the best scientific publication of 2024 was presented for two groundbreaking cancer studies.

Elias Tillandz Prize awarded at the BioCity Symposium to scientific publications on breast cancer recurrence and cancer gene overactivation www.utu.fi/en/news/pres...

EMBO Molecular Medicine: Vol 17, No 8 EMBO Press is an editorially independent publishing platform for the development of EMBO scientific publications.

August issue now online! ➡️ www.embopress.org/toc/17574684...
The cover highlights the study by X Qiao, J Routila, J Westermarck, S Ventelä & al @westermarcklab.bsky.social showing that LIMA1 detection can be used for #HNSCC patients stratification

Scientific image by M. Peltola, Thestra Oy, Turku

Cancer diagnostics company | Thestra We are a cancer diagnostics company which translates high quality academic research results to patient specific companion diagnostics and therapy stratification solutions.

The beautiful image was taken by senior scientist Mari Peltola as part of Thestra´s R&D process to introduce the EPLINEx (the trade name for proprietary LIMA1 assay) IHC assay for clinical #HNSCC diagnostics.
Stay tuned: thestra.fi

We are on the cover! Or what is in the cover is way more important than we, it's evidence that simple IHC assay could be used for recognising #HNSCC patients based on their outcome after surgery-only therapy.
The actual cover and the article can be found here:
www.embopress.org/doi/full/10....

Scientific background of Thestra´s EPLINEx™ method in HNSCC diagnosis reported in EMBO Molecular Medicine  | Thestra Scientific background of Thestra´s EPLINEx™ method is reported in EMBO Molecular Medicine, a leading medical journal.  The findings were validated across all Finnish university hospitals on the use of...

The results are currently to be turned to a routine IHC diagnostic assay by our Start-up company Thestra Ltd. and we aim to bring the assay to clinical use by 2026.
Stay tuned!
thestra.fi/scientific-b...

Based on two prospective cohorts, none of the LIMA1-alpha negative HNSCC patients with non-metastatic disease upon diagnosis died during the follow-up.

New diagnostic breakthrough predicts which head and neck cancer patients can be cured with surgery alone Researchers developed a diagnostic test based on the LIMA1-alpha protein to distinguish patients with head and neck squamous cell carcinoma who can be cured with surgery alone, without the need for

Particularly proud of this collaboration with Sami Ventela and all Finnish #HNSCC clinics revealing LIMA1-alpha as translatable biomarker for selection of HNSCC patients for surgery-only therapies.
www.utu.fi/en/news/pres...
www.embopress.org/doi/full/10....

Emerging roles of the cancerous inhibitor of protein phosphatase 2A (CIP2A) in ovarian cancer Scientific Reports - Emerging roles of the cancerous inhibitor of protein phosphatase 2A (CIP2A) in ovarian cancer

Very nice bioinformatics analysis of the role of #CIP2A in ovarian cancer by @karteris.bsky.social
rdcu.be/exid3

Ps. Some PIs can brag about their 1 million € sequencers, I only got a 100€ sticker printer😅

Lab cleaning day is one of the important @westermarcklab.bsky.social traditions. This year the after-cleaning pizzas were enjoyed in sunny Kupittaa park. Thanks Tiina for organization and everyone for your efforts

Are you looking to start your #lab in a fantastic scientific 🧪environment, with great colleagues, and in a spectacular place to live?

Then check out our open #junior #faculty position at the Department of Oncology, University of Lausanne, Switzerland:
www.unil.ch/dof/en/home/...

⏰ Deadline 27 June

We’ve just marked a major milestone - our community of cancer researchers now numbers 14 000 members, working across 117 countries worldwide 🎉

Thank you to you, our members, for your ongoing support and commitment to advancing cancer research. Your passion and dedication inspire everything we do.

Fantastic EACR @helloeacr.bsky.social annual congress in Lisbon. Great talks Great atmosphere Great to meet all old and new friends