Jonathan Richard Whitfield
jwhitfield@vhio.net
Current position
- Senior Researcher of VHIO´s Models of Cancer Therapies Group
Academic Qualifications
- 1991-1994 B.A. (Honours) | M.A. Downing College, Cambridge University, U.K.
- 1996-2000 Ph.D. Eisai London Research Laboratories, University College London, U.K.
Prizes and Scholarships
- 1996-2000 Ph.D. Fellowship funded by Eisai
- 2002 Selected for funded exchange stay at Eisai Research Labs, Tsukuba, Japan (1 month)
- 2003-2006 Human Frontier Science Program Long-Term Fellowship ($130,000)
- 2014 Prize: VHIR Photography Concourse
- 2015 Weizmann Institute of Science Travel grant to attend the joint Weizmann/VHIO Conference “Cell Communication in Translational Research”, Rehovot, Israel.
- 2015 Joint VHIR/Roche/ACCIÓ prize 1st prize: ‘Concurs d’inovació en salut’ based on innovation on results derived from biomedical research
- 2015-2017 Fundación BBVA Award Grant to cover salary and research costs (171,000€)
Peer-reviewed publications
- Ham J, Babij C, Whitfield J, Pfarr CM, Lallemand D, Yaniv M, and Rubin LL (1995) A c-Jun dominant negative mutant protects sympathetic neurons against programmed cell death. Neuron 14 (5), 927-39
- Vekrellis KV, McCarthy MJ, Watson A, Whitfield J, Rubin LL, and Ham J (1997) Bax promotes neuronal cell death and is downregulated during the development of the nervous system. Development 124, 1239-49
- Gorrie GH, Vallis Y, Stephenson A, Whitfield J, Browning B, Smart TG, and Moss SJ (1997) Assembly of GABAA receptors composed of a1 and b2 subunits. J. Neurosci. 17 (17), 6587-96
- Whitfield J * / Eilers A *, Babij C, Rubin LL, and Ham J (1998) Role of the Jun kinase pathway in the regulation of c-Jun expression and apoptosis in sympathetic neurons. J. Neurosci. 18 (5), 1713-24. * Joint first authors
- Eilers A, Whitfield J, Vekrellis K, Neame SJ, Shah B, and Ham J (1999) c-Jun and Bax: regulators of programmed cell death in developing neurons. Biochem. Soc. Trans. 27 (6), 790-7
- Ham J, Eilers A, Whitfield J, Neame SJ, and Shah B (2000) c-Jun and the transcriptional control of neuronal apoptosis. Biochem. Pharmacol. 60, 1015-21
- Eilers A, Whitfield J, Shah B, Spadoni C, Desmond H, and Ham J (2001) Direct inhibition of JNK in sympathetic neurons prevents c-jun promoter activation and NGF withdrawal-induced death. J. Neurochem. 76 (5), 1439-54
- Parkinson D, Dong Z, Bunting H, Whitfield J, Meier C, Marie H, Mirsky R, and Jessen KR (2001) TGFb mediates Schwann cell death in vitro and in vivo. J. Neurosci. 21 (21), 8572-85
- Whitfield J, Neame S, Bernard O, Paquet L, and Ham J (2001) Dominant negative c-Jun promotes neuronal survival by inhibiting Bim expression and mitochondrial cytochrome c release. Neuron 29 (3), 629-43
- Whitfield J, Harada K, Bardelle C, Staddon JM (2003) High-throughput methods to detect dimerization of Bcl-2 family proteins. Anal. Biochem. 322(2), 170-8
- Graczyk PP, […], Whitfield J, […], Inoue A (2005) The neuroprotective action of JNK3 inhibitors based on the 6,7-dh-5H-p[1,2]imidazole scaffold. Bioorg. Med. Chem. Lett. 15(21), 4666-70
- Dansen TB, Whitfield J, Brown-Swigart L, Rostker F, Evan GI (2006) Specific requirement for Bax, not Bak, in Myc-induced apoptosis and tumor suppression in vivo. J. Biol. Chem. 281 (16), 10890-5
- Soucek L, Whitfield J, Martins CP, Finch AJ, Murphy DM, Sodir M, Karnezis AN, Brown-Swigart L, Nasi S, Evan GI. (2008) Modeling Myc inhibition as a cancer therapy. Nature 455, 679-683
- Whitfield JR, Soucek L (2012) Tumor microenvironment: becoming sick of Myc. Cell Mol Life Sci. 69 (6), 931-4
- Soucek L, Whitfield JR, Sodir NM, Massó-Vallés D, Serrano E, Karnezis AN, Swigart LB, Evan GI (2013) Inhibition of Myc family proteins eradicates KRas-driven lung cancer in mice. Genes and Dev. 27(5), 504-13
- O’Donovan DS, MacFhearraigh S, Whitfield J, Swigart LB, Evan GI, McGee MM (2013) Sequential Cdk1 and Plk1 phosphorylation of protein tyrosine phosphatase 1B promotes mitotic cell death. Cell Death Dis. e468
- Whitfield JR *, Annibali D *, et al. (2014) Myc inhibition is effective against glioma and reveals a role for Myc in proficient mitosis. Nat. Commun. 18 (5), 4632, DOI: 10.1038/ncomms5632 * Joint first authors
- Casey SC, […] Whitfield JR, […] and Felsher DW (2015) Assessing the carcinogenic potential of low-dose exposures to chemical mixtures in the environment: Carcinognesis, 36 Suppl 1:S160-83
- Goodson WH, […], Whitfield JR, […], Hu Z (2015) Assessing the carcinogenic potential of low-dose exposures to chemical mixtures in the environment: The Challenge ahead. Carcinogenesis, 36 Suppl 1:S254-96
- Massó-Vallés D, […], Whitfield JR, […] (2015) Ibrutinib exerts potent anti-fibrotic and anti-tumor activity in mouse models of pancreatic adenocarcinoma. Cancer Research, 15;75(8):1675-81
- Whitfield JR, Beaulieu ME and Soucek L (2017) Strategies to Inhibit Myc and Their Clinical Applicability. Front. Cell Dev. Biol. 5:10. doi: 10.3389/fcell.2017.00010
- Jauset T, Massó-Vallés D, Martínez-Martín S, Beaulieu ME, Foradada L, Fiorentino FP, Yokota J, Haendler B, Siegel S, Whitfield JR, Soucek L (2018) BET inhibition is an effective approach against KRAS-driven PDAC and NSCLC. Oncotarget, Apr 10;9(27):18734-18746. doi: 10.18632/oncotarget.24648
- Beaulieu ME, […], Whitfield JR, Lavigne P and Soucek L (2019) Intrinsic cell-penetrating activity propels Omomyc from proof of concept to viable anti-Myc therapy. Sci Trans Med. Mar 20;11(484)
- Whitfield JR and Soucek L (2019) Editorial Overview. Peptides in Cancer. Current Opinion in Pharmacology, 47 iii-v. doi: 10.1016/j.coph.2019.06.001
- Zacarías-Fluck MF, […], Whitfield JR, […], Soucek L. (2021) The Wnt signaling receptor Fzd9 is essential for Myc-driven tumorigenesis in pancreatic islets. Life Sci Alliance. Mar 2;4(5):e201900490
- Whitfield JR and Soucek L (2021) An “omycs” toolkit to work with Myc. “The Myc gene: methods and protocols” Methods in Molecular Biology Series, Springer Humana Press
Additional publications
- Whitfield J, Neame S, and Ham J (2003) Methods for culturing primary sympathetic neurons and for determining neuronal viability. Methods in Molecular Biology, vol. 228: Apoptosis Methods and Protocols, ed. H.J.M. Brady.
- Neame S, Whitfield J, and Ham J (2003) Immunocytochemical techniques for studying apoptosis in primary sympathetic neurons. Methods in Molecular Biology, vol. 228: Apoptosis Methods and Protocols, ed. H. Brady.
- Whitfield J, Littlewood T, Evan GI and Soucek L (2015) The estrogen receptor fusion system in mouse models: a reversible switch. Cold Spring Harbor Protoc: Mouse Models of Cancer. (3):227-34. pdb.prot077966
- Whitfield J, Littlewood TD, Soucek L (2015) Tamoxifen administration to mice. Cold Spring Harbor Protoc: Mouse Models of Cancer. (3):269-71. pdb.prot077966. doi: 10.1101, ISBN 978-1-621820-03-1
- Beaulieu ME, Jauset T, Massó-Vallés DM, Soucek L, and Whitfield JR (2017) Mouse models in personalised cancer medicine. Cancer Genetics and Genomics for Personalized Medicine. Edited by Il-Jin Kim. ISBN 978-981-4669-87-0
- Bazenet C, […] Vekrellis K and Whitfield J (2017) Lee Rubin: Our mentor and role model. Science 355 (6327), 806. doi: 10.1126/science.aam8703
- Editor of the special issue “Cancer and Immunomodulation 2019” Current Opinion in Pharmacology (COPHAR) Co-editors: Soucek L, Whitfield JR, Francesco DV, Pablo P
- Editor of the second edition of the book “The Myc gene: methods and protocols (2021)” Methods in Molecular Biology Series, Springer Humana Press. Co-editors: Whitfield JR, Soucek L
