Biography:Alain R. Thierry

From HandWiki

}}

Alain R. Thierry
Alain R. Thierry - French Geneticist and Cancer Researcher
Born
France
NationalityFrench
Alma materUniversity of Clermont-Ferrand (France)

University of Montpellier II (france)

Faculty of Médecine, University of Paris-Sud (France)
Awards2021: Innovation Prize, Montpellier Université d'Excellence (MUSE)

2016: Grand Prix for Therapeutic Innovation, Beatrice Denys Foundation & the French Foundation for Medical Research (FRM). , 2010: GEFLUC Award (Collective of French Companies against Cancer), France. 2002: National Innovation Award, French Ministry of Education & Research.

1994: Federal Technology Award, National Cancer Institute, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, USA.
Scientific career
FieldsGenetics and Cancer Research
InstitutionsGeorgetown University Medical Centre

National Cancer Institute - National Institutes of Health Université de Montpellier

IRCM / INSERM

Alain Thierry (born 21 October 1959) is a French geneticist and cancer researcher. He specializes in the clinical applications of circulating DNA analysis, notably in cancer care management. He is currently Director of Research at the INSERM's Cancer Research Institute in Montpellier, France.

Education

Thierry obtained his primary degree in Cellular and Molecular Biology (MSc) at the University of Clermont-Ferrand in France in 1982. In 1986 he completed his PhD in Biochemistry, Cellular and Molecular Pharmacology at the University of Montpellier II. The following year he was awarded the Certificat d'Etudes Supérieures (CES) in Human Biology in Clinical and Experimental Oncology, from the Paris-Sud Faculty of Medicine.

Career

Thierry began his career in the US as a Postdoctoral Fellow (1988–92) at the Lombardi Cancer Centre in the Georgetown University Medical Centre (Washington DC), going on to work there as Adjunct Assistant Professor from 1992 to 1994. From 1992 to 1996 he was also a Visiting Scientist at the Laboratory of Tumor Cell Biology at the National Institutes of Health in Bethesda, where he worked with Dr. Robert C. Gallo, the laboratory's Director.

Returning to France, from 1997 to 2000 he served as Scientific Director at the Biovector Therapeutics company. From 2001 to 2007 he was Associate Professor at Montpellier University's Faculty of Sciences. Since 2008, he has been the Senior Investigator and Director of Research at the INSERM's Cancer Research Institute of Montpellier (IRCM).

Research

Thierry specializes in the clinical application of liquid biopsy that exploits circulating DNA as a biomarker, notably in cancer management care. He has been the principal investigator in numerous discoveries in drug delivery innovation and application in oncology.

It was during his period at Georgetown that he showed the circumvention of multi-drug resistance in tumors through drug delivery.[1] He built on this work at the US National Cancer Institute,[2] developing gene therapy for cancer and HIV,[3][4] in particular the first long term expression of a transgene by systemic administration with a synthetic delivery system.[5]

While at the University of Montpellier, he worked first on the pharmacokinetics of therapeutic vectorized HIV antisense oligonucleotides in primates (2002).[6] He then went on to demonstrate the biomimetic supramolecular auto-organization of DNA in a synthetic complex (2006).[7]

Since 2006, Thierry has focused increasingly on clinical and basic research into the role of circulating DNA (cirDNA), and on its diagnostic potential in oncology.

His team were amongst the first (in April 2020) to suggest NETs as a key player in COVID-19 pathogenesis (2020)[8] and have shown long COVID-19 (COVID post-acute phase syndrome) to be an effect of the persistence of the production of NETs and auto-antibodies.[9] Recently (2022), they have demonstrated cirDNA association with NETs production in cancer and lupus.[10]

Most recently, Thierry has pioneered work on cirDNA fragmentation, proposing potential solutions towards cancer screening through the use of fragmentomics.[11] This builds on earlier work (2011) on the fragmentation levels of cancer patient cirDNA.[12][13]

According to Google Scholar, he has an h-index of 45.[14]

Awards and honors

  • 2021: Innovation Prize, Montpellier Université d'Excellence (MUSE)[15]
  • 2016: Grand Prix for Therapeutic Innovation, Beatrice Denys Foundation & the French Foundation for Medical Research (FRM).[16][17]
  • 2010: GEFLUC Award (Collective of French Companies against Cancer), France.
  • 2002: National Innovation Award, French Ministry of Education & Research.

References

  1. Thierry, Alain R.; Vigé, Dominique; Coughlin, Steven S.; Belli, James A.; Dritschilo, Anatoly; Rahman, Aquilur (April 1993). "Modulation of doxorubicin resistance in multidrug-resistant cells by liposomes" (in en). The FASEB Journal 7 (6): 572–579. doi:10.1096/fasebj.7.6.8097173. ISSN 0892-6638. PMID 8097173. 
  2. "Kaposi's sarcoma will be initial focus of NCI's Gallo's new outside Institute of Human Virology.". 5 June 1995. https://pink.pharmaintelligence.informa.com/PS026320/Kaposis-sarcoma-will-be-initial-focus-of-NCIs-Gallos-new-outside-Institute-of-Human-Virology. 
  3. nih.gov
  4. Lunardi-lskandar, Yanto; Bryant, Joseph L.; Zeman, Robert A.; Lam, Victor H.; Samaniego, Felipe; Besnier, Jacques M.; Hermans, Philippe; Thierry, Alain R. et al. (May 1995). "Tumorigenesis and metastasis of neoplastic Kaposi's sarcoma cell line in immunodeficient mice blocked by a human pregnancy hormone" (in en). Nature 375 (6526): 64–68. doi:10.1038/375064a0. ISSN 1476-4687. PMID 7723844. Bibcode1995Natur.375...64L. https://www.nature.com/articles/375064a0. 
  5. Thierry, A R; Lunardi-Iskandar, Y; Bryant, J L; Rabinovich, P; Gallo, R C; Mahan, L C (1995-10-10). "Systemic gene therapy: biodistribution and long-term expression of a transgene in mice." (in en). Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 92 (21): 9742–9746. doi:10.1073/pnas.92.21.9742. ISSN 0027-8424. PMID 7568209. Bibcode1995PNAS...92.9742T. 
  6. Tavitian, Bertrand; Marzabal, Stéphane; Boutet, Valérie; Kühnast, Bertrand; Terrazzino, Salvatore; Moynier, Marinette; Dollé, Frédéric; Deverre, Jean Robert et al. (2002-04-01). "Characterization of a Synthetic Anionic Vector for Oligonucleotide Delivery Using in Vivo Whole Body Dynamic Imaging" (in en). Pharmaceutical Research 19 (4): 367–376. doi:10.1023/A:1015133205457. ISSN 1573-904X. PMID 12033366. 
  7. Schmutz, M.; Durand, D.; Debin, A.; Palvadeau, Y.; Etienne, A.; Thierry, A. R. (1999-10-26). "DNA packing in stable lipid complexes designed for gene transfer imitates DNA compaction in bacteriophage" (in en). Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 96 (22): 12293–12298. doi:10.1073/pnas.96.22.12293. ISSN 0027-8424. PMID 10535915. Bibcode1999PNAS...9612293S. 
  8. Thierry, Alain; Roch, Benoit (2020-04-15). NETs By-products and Extracellular DNA May Play a Key Role in COVID-19 Pathogenesis: Incidence on Patient Monitoring and Therapy. doi:10.20944/preprints202004.0238.v1. https://www.preprints.org/manuscript/202004.0238/v1. 
  9. Pisareva, Ekaterina; Badiou, Stephanie; Mihalovičová, Lucia; Mirandola, Alexia; Pastor, Brice; Kudriavtsev, Andrei; Berger, Marie; Roubille, Camille et al. (January 2023). "Persistence of neutrophil extracellular traps and anticardiolipin auto-antibodies in post-acute phase COVID-19 patients" (in en). Journal of Medical Virology 95 (1). doi:10.1002/jmv.28209. ISSN 0146-6615. PMID 36226380. 
  10. Pisareva, Ekaterina; Mihalovičová, Lucia; Pastor, Brice; Kudriavtsev, Andrei; Mirandola, Alexia; Mazard, Thibault; Badiou, Stephanie; Maus, Ulrich et al. (2022-11-28). "Neutrophil extracellular traps have auto-catabolic activity and produce mononucleosome-associated circulating DNA" (in en). Genome Medicine 14 (1): 135. doi:10.1186/s13073-022-01125-8. ISSN 1756-994X. PMID 36443816. 
  11. Thierry, A.R. (January 2023). "Circulating DNA fragmentomics and cancer screening" (in en). Cell Genomics 3 (1). doi:10.1016/j.xgen.2022.100242. PMID 36777187. 
  12. Sanchez, Cynthia; Roch, Benoit; Mazard, Thibault; Blache, Philippe; Dache, Zahra Al Amir; Pastor, Brice; Pisareva, Ekaterina; Tanos, Rita et al. (2021-04-08). "Circulating nuclear DNA structural features, origins, and complete size profile revealed by fragmentomics" (in en). JCI Insight 6 (7). doi:10.1172/jci.insight.144561. ISSN 0021-9738. PMID 33571170. PMC 8119211. https://insight.jci.org/articles/view/144561. 
  13. Mouliere, Florent; Robert, Bruno; Arnau Peyrotte, Erika; Del Rio, Maguy; Ychou, Marc; Molina, Franck; Gongora, Celine; Thierry, Alain R. (2011-09-06). Lee, Terence. ed. "High Fragmentation Characterizes Tumour-Derived Circulating DNA" (in en). PLOS ONE 6 (9). doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0023418. ISSN 1932-6203. PMID 21909401. Bibcode2011PLoSO...623418M. 
  14. "alain THIERRY". https://scholar.google.fr/citations?user=dprGAvIAAAAJ&hl=fr. 
  15. "Cinq chercheuses et chercheurs reçoivent les Prix 2021 de l'Innovation "Montpellier Université d'Excellence" - Université de Montpellier" (in fr-FR). 16 December 2021. https://www.umontpellier.fr/en/articles/cinq-chercheuses-et-chercheurs-recoivent-les-prix-2021-de-linnovation-montpellier-universite-dexcellence. 
  16. "La Fondation pour l'Innovation Thérapeutique Béatrice Denys: récompenses 2016". https://www.frm.org/fondation/fondations-abritees/fondations-de-chercheurs/fondation-pour-linnovation-therapeutique-beatrice-denys. 
  17. "Prix de l'Innovation Therapeutique Beatrice Denys.". Siric. 24 June 2016. http://montpellier-cancer.com/remise-du-prix-de-linnovation-therapeutique-beatrice-denys-au-dr-alain-thierry/.