Dr Jessica Chitty

After graduating with a Bachelor of Science in Biochemistry from the University of Sussex, Dr Jessica Chitty completed a PhD in the fungal pathogenesis laboratory at the University of Queensland. During her PhD project she characterised enzymes of the purine biosynthesis pathway as potential candidates for drug development.

Jessica joined the Matrix and Metastasis Lab at the Garvan Institute of Medical Research in 2017 to investigate copper-dependent lysyl oxidases as a potential anti-stromal target in pancreatic cancer. Treatment of pancreatic cancer primarily focuses on administering drugs that kill cancer cells. However, an important consequence of chemotherapy induced cancer cell death is tumour fibrosis (scarring). The excessive fibrosis acts to restrict chemotherapy from entering the tumour, blunting the efficacy of treatment and enhancing metastasis. Therapies that co-target tumour fibrosis are offering a novel therapeutic avenue to improve treatment efficacy.