Chemotherapy: Open Access
Open Access

Gary L. Johanning

Biography

Gary L. Johanning, MS, PhD, is an Associate Professor of Comparative Medicine at the Michale E. Keeling Center for Comparative Medicine and Research with the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center at Bastrop TX.  He received his B.S., M.S. and PhD in Biochemistry from the University of Missouri at Columbia and completed a postdoctoral fellowship in the Biochemistry Department at Case Western Reserve University.  He is an Editorial Board Member of Cancer Management and Research and The Open Lung Cancer Journal, and is Associate Editor of Nutrition and Dietary Supplements. He has been awarded grants from the National Institutes of Health, the Department of Defense and several foundations.  He is a member of the Executive Committee of The Nutritional Sciences Council. His primary research interests include micronutrients and their effect on chemotherapy efficacy, nutrition and cancer, endogenous retroviruses, and cancer prevention and immunotherapy. 

Research Interest

A major goal of the research in Dr. Johanning’s laboratory is to determine the role of the vitamin folic acid (folate) in carcinogenesis, cancer prevention, and immune response. An important aspect of this research is evaluating the influence of folic acid on the development of resistance to cisplatin and other chemotherapeutic agents. Cancer cells can become resistant to the cytotoxic action of chemotherapeutic agents either at the outset (intrinsic resistance) or after the agents are administered for a period of time (acquired resistance). Resistance to cisplatin and other agents is an important problem in cancer therapy, and the mechanism by which resistance develops is not clear. Dr. Johanning has obtained data indicating that folic acid can prevent the development of both intrinsic and acquired resistance to cisplatin in lung and ovarian cancer cell lines.