Pemberton, Lucy F.
Primary Appointment
Associate Professor, Microbiology, Immunology, and Cancer Biology
Education
- PhD, , Imperial Cancer Research Fund, London, UK
Contact Information
PO Box 800734
Pinn Hall, Rm 7082
Telephone: 434-243-6737
Email: lfp2n@virginia.edu
Research Disciplines
Biochemistry, Cancer Biology, Cell and Developmental Biology, Epigenetics, Genetics, Molecular Biology
Research Interests
Director of Graduate Studies for Microbiology, Immunology and Cancer Biology
Research Description
Director of Graduate Studies for Microbiology, Immunology and Cancer Biology
Please contact Dr. Pemberton for any information or guidance regarding our graduate program.
Associate Director of Education, UVA Comprehensive Cancer Center
Dr Pemberton leads the Cancer Research Training and Education Core (CRTEC) which integrates and coordinates education, training, and career development throughout the Cancer Center community. In a highly collaborative cross-campus setting CRTEC provides cancer-focused educational and experiential initiatives, funding opportunities, and professional development for trainees from grade school through junior faculty.
https://med.virginia.edu/cancer-research/training-and-education/
Research Interests
Prior to these positions Dr Pemberton ran an active research lab at UVA studying how the assembly and disassembly of chromatin regulates gene expression, replication and DNA repair. She remains interested in how regulation of chromatin assembly/disassembly is fundamental to cellular processes such as cell division, differentiation and development, and how misregulation can lead to genomic instability and ultimately cancer. Many proteins and protein complexes can modify and assemble chromatin. Dr Pemberton investigated the role that histone chaperones and chromatin assembly proteins played in this process, in particular, the early events of chromatin assembly, including how nuclear import helps coordinate the assembly of chromatin.
Nuclear transport is intimately involved in the response of cells to external signals and is important in the development of cancer, and infection by viruses. Nuclear import and export occur through the nuclear pore complex (NPC), a large structure embedded in the nuclear membrane, and is mediated by an evolutionarily conserved group of transport factors called karyopherins or importins. Dr Pemberton identified the specific karyopherins for each of the core histones and determined the nuclear localization sequences they recognize. Her lab showed that the histone chaperone Nucleosome Assembly Protein 1 (Nap1p) also played an important role in nuclear import of histones. Nap1p is a nucleo-cytoplasmic shuttling protein that can act as a cofactor for the import of H2A and H2B, as well as the histone variant H2A.Z. Nap1p is part of an evolutionarily conserved superfamily of proteins. Human cells have 4 Nap1 proteins, the SET protein and the TSPY and TSPYL protein families. Different members of this superfamily have been shown to be upregulated or mutated in various cancers such as leukemias and gonadoblastoma.
Dr Pemberton’s lab focused on questions such as how and when histones are synthesized in the cytoplasm and imported into the nucleus and which transport factors are important in this process. How histone chaperones cooperate with nuclear transport factors and coordinate the assembly of histones onto DNA and lastly, what role does nuclear import and chromatin assembly play in the regulation of replication and transcription.
Dr Pemberton’s publications in these areas can be found here.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/myncbi/lucy.pemberton.1/bibliography/public/