Cancer Science & Therapy

Nives Pecina Slaus

Nives Pecina Slaus, PhD
Professor, Department of Biology
University of Zagreb, Croatia

Biography

Nives Pecina-Slaus is an Associate professor at the department of biology and Head of the Laboratory of Neuro-oncology Croatian Institute for Brain Research Medical School, University of Zagreb. She has received her B.S. in 1990. her M.S. in 1992. from the University of Zagreb, Faculty of Math and Sciences, and her Ph. D. in the field of molecular oncology in 1998 from Medical School University of Zagreb. She was trained at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory Undergraduate Research Program, New York, USA in 1990; Georgetown University, Washington DC, USA in 1991; at the Division of Molecular Medicine at the Ruder Boškovic Institute in Zagreb in 1993. She joined Croatian Institute for Brain Research team in 2003 and in 2004 was appointed Head of the Laboratory of Neurooncology Croatian Institute for Brain Research, Zagreb. In 2005 she was elected Senior Investigator (scientific rank of full professor) and in 2007 associate professor at the Department of Biology, School of Medicine. She teaches Medical biology and was mentor on numberous theses. She was granted and was/is leading as prinicpal investigator five scientific projects. Her resarch has led to publication of more than 100 publications - scientific papers, a book, abstracts and book chapters. Her main fields of reseach are cancer genetics, Wnt signaling pathway, brain tumorigenesis, tumor suppressor genes, oncogenes, genetic profiles of brain tumors. She acts as a reviewer for Ministry of Science, Education and Sports Croatia, for Slovenian Research Agency (ARRS) for National council for university education, many scientific peer-reviewed journals (Brain Research, The Journal of Pediatric Biochemistry; International Orthopaedics, European Spine Journal, Journal of Pediatric Neurology, Kidney International, PLOSOne; Genes and Cancer, Lijecnicki vjesnik, Croatian Medical Journal). She is a member on editorial boards of scientific journals Frontiers in Bioscience, Acta Clinica Croatica, Cancer Cell International and Scientific Advisory Board of Melanoma Molecular Project Map and member of the review board of Journal of Pediatric Biochemistry, Journal of Chinese Clinical Medicine, Journal of Pediatric Neurology. She was awarded two scientific awards by Croatian Medical Association and Academy of Medical Sciences for best paper in basic medical research for young scientist. She is a member of Croatian Society of Human Genetics, Croatian Medical Association, Croatian Biological Society, European Society for Human Genetics, European Association for Cancer Research, Croatian Society for Neuroscience.

Research Interest

Cancer genetics, Wnt signaling pathway, brain tumorigenesis, tumor suppressor genes, oncogenes, genetic profiles of brain tumors, beta-catenin, axin, E-cadherin, APC, loss of heterozygosity, microsatellite instability, protein expression.