Our lab aims to improve treatments for women with ovarian cancer, particularly those that are resistant to chemotherapy. We are interested in developing therapies that can adapt to the evolution of chemotherapy resistance over time such as Adaptive Therapy. We also employ drug repurposing approaches and oncolytic viral therapies to tackle drug resistance. In all cases, we aim to translate our laboratory findings into clinical trials for cancer patients.
LiquidCNA: Tracking subclonal evolution from longitudinal liquid biopsies using somatic copy number alterations. iScience (2021) 24(8):102889. PMID: 34401670
Chloroxine Overrides DNA Damage Tolerance to Restore Platinum Sensitivity in High-grade Serous Ovarian Cancer. Cell Death and Disease (2021) 12(4):395. PMID: 33854036
Copy number signatures and mutational processes in ovarian carcinoma. Nat Genet (2018) 50(9):1262-1270. PMID: 30104763
CRISPR/Cas9-Mediated Trp53 and Brca2 Knockout to Generate Improved Murine Models of Ovarian High-Grade Serous Carcinoma. Cancer Res (2016) 76(20):6118-6129. PMID: 27530326
Pharmacological Inhibition of β3 Integrin Reduces the Inflammatory Toxicities Caused by Oncolytic Adenovirus without Compromising Anticancer Activity. Cancer Res (2015) 75(14):2811-21. PMID: 25977332
Chemotherapy Resistance
High grade serous cancer (HGSC) is the most common subtype of ovarian cancer. It is initially very responsive to platinum and taxane chemotherapy but more than 70% patients develop chemotherapy resistance and the disease becomes incurable. PARP inhibitors are increasingly used in the treatment of ovarian cancer but resistance to these drugs is common and optimal duration of therapy is largely unknown.
Circumventing drug resistance is therefore a major unmet clinical need. The Lockley lab has created a panel of chemotherapy and PARPi resistant HGSC cell lines and animal models. They have already used these models to identify novel treatments for platinum-resistant disease. Adaptive Therapy is a novel treatment paradigm in which drug dose is tailored to the evolution of chemotherapy resistance in individual patients over time. Dr Lockley has used these models to demonstrate the feasibility of adaptive therapy in ovarian cancer and has begun to elucidate the underlying genetic mechanisms. Dr Lockley has successfully translated this approach to the ACTOv clinical trial (Adaptive ChemoTherapy in Ovarian cancer) that will recruit patients from 9 UK sites beginning in 2022.
Rare gynaecological cancers
Dr Lockley has a special interest in rare gynaecological cancers, particularly ovarian germ cell tumours. She is a member of the NCRI early onset working party as well as the International Consortium of Malignant Germ Cell tumours (MaGIC) where she is co-lead for the translational committee and is also developing the next international trial for poor risk germ cell tumours.
Tissue Collection
Dr Lockley set up and continues to lead the Barts Gynae Tissue Bank. This repository of tissue kindly donated by Barts patients is widely used by scientists at the BCI and with a range of industrial and academic collaborators.
Carvedilol targets β-arrestins to rewire innate immunity and improve oncolytic adenoviral therapy Hoare JI, Osmani B, O’Sullivan EA et al. Communications Biology (2022) 5(7)
Surgical management and outcomes for stage 1 malignant ovarian germ cell tumours: A UK multicentre retrospective cohort study Graham R, MacDonald ND, Lockley M et al. European Journal of Obstetrics and Gynecology and Reproductive Biology (2022) 271(7) 138-144
Single-agent carboplatin AUC10 in metastatic seminoma: A multi-centre UK study of 216 patients Alifrangis C, Sharma A, Chowdhury S et al. European Journal of Cancer (2022) 164(7) 105-113
Venous thromboembolism in women with ovarian cancer undergoing neoadjuvant chemotherapy prior to cytoreductive surgery: A retrospective study Oxley SG, Achampong YA, Sambandan N et al. Acta Obstetricia et Gynecologica Scandinavica (2021) 100(7) 2091-2096
423 Results of the avoiding late diagnosis of ovarian cancer (ALDO) project; a pilot national surveillance program for BRCA mutation-carriers Philpott S, Raikou M, Manchanda R et al. International Journal of Gynecological Cancer (2021) 31(10) a373-a374
Implementation of multigene germline and parallel somatic genetic testing in epithelial ovarian cancer: Signpost study Chandrasekaran D, Sobocan M, Blyuss O et al. Cancers (2021) 13(7)
LiquidCNA: Tracking subclonal evolution from longitudinal liquid biopsies using somatic copy number alterations Lakatos E, Hockings H, Mossner M et al. iScience (2021) 24(7)
Re: ‘Can we replace adjuvant chemotherapy with surveillance for stage IA-C immature ovarian teratomas of any grade? An international multicenter analysis’ Lockley M, Stoneham S, Shamash J et al. European Journal of Cancer (2021) 152(7) 255-256
A human multi-cellular model shows how platelets drive production of diseased extracellular matrix and tissue invasion Malacrida B, Nichols S, Maniati E et al. iScience (2021) 24(7)
Chloroxine overrides DNA damage tolerance to restore platinum sensitivity in high-grade serous ovarian cancer Silva VL, Saxena J, Nicolini F et al. Cell Death and Disease (2021) 12(7)
For additional publications, please click hereAcademic positions
Education and qualifications