Lauren Clai Elizabeth Morehead, MD, PhD

Affiliate Member

Research Program:

Cancer Biology

Faculty Rank:

MD/PhD Candidate

Campus:

University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences

College:

College of Medicine

Department:

Biochemistry & Molecular Biology

Cancer Research Interest

Disease Site Focus: Cutaneous/Melanoma
Research Focus Area: Treatment
Type of Research: Basic, Translational
Research Keywords: melanoma, MHC-I, resveratrol, immune checkpoint inhibition
Research Interest Statement: My research project is focused on the potential of resveratrol as an adjuvant to immune checkpoint blockade treatment for metastatic melanoma. Despite the substantial improvements in survival that immune checkpoint blockade has lent to melanoma treatment, only about half of all patients respond to it. One contributory factor to the success of immune checkpoint blockade is expression of MHC-I on tumor cells. MHC-I allows T-cells to recognize tumor cells as “foreign” so that they can be targeted and destroyed by the immune system. However, MHC-I expression is often downregulated in cancer cells. My preliminary research has indicated that resveratrol can potentiate MHC-I expression on cancer cells, with the mechanism being not well-defined. My goal is to explore the possibility of resveratrol as an immunostimulatory compound for the treatment of metastatic melanoma.

Morehead LC, Koss B, Fil D, [et al.]. Resveratrol induces major histocompatibility complex class I antigen presentation in a STING-dependent and independent manner in melanoma. Molecular immunology. 2023 163:188-195. PMID: 37837954. PMCID: PMC10792541.
Garg S, Morehead LC, Bird JT, [et al.]. Characterization of methionine dependence in melanoma cells. Molecular omics. 2023. PMID: 37782107. PMCID: PMC10903584.
Morehead LC, Garg S, Wallis KF, [et al.]. Increased Response to Immune Checkpoint Inhibitors with Dietary Methionine Restriction in a Colorectal Cancer Model. Cancers. 2023 15(18). PMID: 37760436. PMCID: PMC10526448.
Azevedo-Pouly AC, Appell LE, Burdine L, [et al., including Morehead LC]. Chemical inhibition of DNA-PKcs impairs the activation and cytotoxicity of CD4(+) helper and CD8(+) effector T cells. Immunology and cell biology. 2023. PMID: 37149747. PMCID: PMC10527493.
Wallis KF, Morehead LC, Bird JT, [et al.]. Differences in cell death in methionine versus cysteine depletion. Environmental and molecular mutagenesis. 2021. PMID: 33615565. PMCID: PMC8130902.