Umar SA, Wang W, Jeon D, Pham LK, Ward-Shaw ET, Lee D, Hu R, Bilger A, Spurgeon ME, Lambert PF. Estrogen receptor α (Esr1) mediates estrogen’s ability to promote papillomavirus-induced cutaneous disease in male and female mice. mBio. 2026 May 29:e0078326. doi: 10.1128/mbio.00783-26. Epub ahead of print. PMID: 42212803.
Tumors of reproductive tissues often use the steroid hormones that drive the growth of these tissues as tumor drivers. Indeed, Dr. Lambert’s group has previously shown that cervical tumors depend upon the estrogen-estrogen receptor (E/Esr1) pathway for their survival. Here, this group demonstrates that this E/Esr1 axis is required for the growth of skin papilloma tumors, and that -perhaps surprisingly- this estrogen-dependent pathway promotes the growth of tumors via altered immune cell function not only in females but in males as well.
Wang C, Bristol JA, Nelson SE, Chen T, Hendrickson C, Baiu DC, Riel M, Hayes M, Ranheim EA, Gumperz JE, Johannsen EC, Kenney SC. Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) infection causes human germinal center B cell-derived lymphomas in the absence of EBNA2 expression. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 2026 Jun 2;123(22):e2525164123. doi: 10.1073/pnas.2525164123. Epub 2026 May 26. PMID: 42189985.
The Epstein Barr virus (EBV) is present in most of us but causes tumors in only a few. For those people, EBV is the root cause of their lymphomas (or some types of epithelial tumors). Using their understanding of the viral life cycle and gene dependencies, the teams led by Drs. Kenney and Johannsen have made the first model of B cell lymphomas that form in the germinal center of lymph glands in mice; this will be an important tool for studying this tumor type.
Franke M, Kirchner R, Barredo B, Zaidan A, Torres-Esquius S, Acha P, Novoa-Jáuregui S, Montoro MJ, Churpek JE, Babushok DV, Lasho T, Kewan T, Ogbue O, Mangaonkar A, Jerez A, Ferrer A, Patnaik MM. Promoter TERT-Related Hematopoietic Somatic Mosaicism in Patients With Telomere Biology Disorders. Am J Hematol. 2026 Jun 15. doi: 10.1002/ajh.70412. Epub ahead of print. PMID: 42290596.
Several age-related health problems are connected to abnormal telomere shortening, where telomeres provide protection against massive chromosomal instability. For bone marrow hematopoietic stem cells, the loss of telomeres leads to senescence, genomic instability, bone marrow failure and blood cancers. Working together with an international collaborative group, Dr. Churpek showed that if there is a somatic gain of function for transcription of pTERT (responsible for telomere maintenance) in patients with this telomere disorder, these pathologies are suppressed, which suggests a potential treatment route.