Rate My Professor Adele Woolley

Associate Professor Adele Woolley serves in the Department of Pathology and Molecular Medicine at the University of Otago's Dunedin School of Medicine, Faculty of Medicine. She earned her BPhEd and BSc in physical education and physiology, followed by a PGDipSci in neuroscience and a PhD in developmental neurobiology, all from the University of Otago. Joining the Cell Transformation Group in 2006 under the mentorship of Professor Antony Braithwaite, she has progressed to Associate Professor and established the Woolley Laboratory. Woolley teaches PATH 201 Foundations of Human Diseases as course convenor, PATH 302 Cancer Biology, MICN 301 Vertical Pathology Module, and CMC 301 Cancer and Diabetes. She contributes to the Department of Pathology Teaching Committee and BBiomedSc Operational Committee, and holds memberships in the Australian and New Zealand Society for Cell and Developmental Biology, Federation of University Women, Dunedin Company of Physiologists, and TEMTIA.

Her research centers on cytoskeletal dynamics in cell cycle regulation, migration, chromosomal instability, and metastasis in cancer, as well as the tumor microenvironment's role in cancer and inflammatory diseases like osteoarthritis and rheumatoid arthritis, aiming to develop disease biomarkers. The Woolley Laboratory investigates protein interactions such as YB-1 with SEPT2 and the cytoskeleton, stress granules, post-translational modifications like phosphorylation, and their perturbation in cancer progression. Techniques include CRISPaint for live-cell imaging of labeled proteins using Lionheart and Andor Dragonfly systems. Current student projects explore YB-1-SEPT2 in breast cancer invasion and Δ133p53 in IL-6-mediated colorectal cancer migration via cancer-associated fibroblasts. Key publications include 'The hinge-1 domain of Flna is not necessary for diverse physiological functions in mice' (Wade et al., European Journal of Clinical Investigation, 2024), 'Activated CD90/Thy-1 fibroblasts co-express the Δ133p53β isoform and are associated with highly inflamed rheumatoid arthritis' (Wiles et al., Arthritis Research & Therapy, 2023), 'Calpains released from necrotic tumor cells enhance antigen cross-presentation to activate CD8+ T cells in vitro' (Shields et al., Journal of Immunology, 2022), and 'Prognostic association of YB-1 expression in breast cancers' (Woolley et al., PLOS One, 2011).