Team - Functional Cancer Genomics Lab
Group Leader: Jean-Philippe Theurillat MD
Jean-Philippe Theurillat studied Medicine at the University of Zurich, where he received his Federal Diploma in Human Medicine. Specializing first in Internal Medicine and then in Surgical Pathology at the University Hospital in Zurich and CHUV in Lausanne, he then obtained his certificate in pathology. After a period as a research fellow at ETH and at the Broad Institute of MIT & Harvard in in Boston, he received a prestigious starting professorship grant from the Swiss National Science Foundation in 2014, which allowed him to develop his research interests at the IOR. His work has been recognized by several awards, including the Pfizer Prize for Oncology Research in 2012 and the Astellas Prize in 2017. Since 2019, Prof. Theurillat is a tenured professor at the Faculty of Biomedical Sciences at USI and since 2025 guest professor at the Department of Pathology at the University Hospital Zurich.
His major contributions include:
- Identifications and functional characterization of recurrent mutations in the SPOP gene in prostate cancer, endometrial cancer, and neurodevelopmental disorders.
- Development of a prostate cancer atlas with molecular data derived from primary and metastatic specimens that enables the discovery of molecular pathways of tumor progression and development of new therapies (https://www.prostatecanceratlas.org).
- Identification of TRIM24 as a transcriptional regulator implicated in the adaptation to hormonal therapies.
- Role of the pioneer transcription factors FOXA1 and FOXA2 in prostate cancer progression
Members
Bossi Daniela, Staff Scientist
Coazzoli Marco, Research Assistant
Corpetti Matteo, PhD Student
El Marrahi Anissa, PhD Student
Formaggio Nicolò, PostDoc
Nicastri Simone, Web Developer
Salfi Giuseppe, Visiting Research Fellow
Theurillat Jean-Philippe, Group Leader
Thillaiyampalam Gayathri, Bioinformatician
Zhang Jichang, Bioinformatician
