Affiliation: Cancer Research Center of Lyon (CRCL) (France) and University of Pittsburgh – Liver Research Center (USA)

Dr. Carla Frau is a Research Scientist qualified in cancer and stem cell-derived disease modeling.

With over ten years of experience in academia, she developed expertise in stem cell biology and building complex disease ex vivo tools, with devotion to the cutting-edge models of intestinal organoids, patient-derived pluripotent stem cells, and co-culture of different cells lineages.

Carla Frau received her "Doctor of Pharmacy" degree from the University of Cagliari (Italy) in 2010 with a final score of 110/110 Summa cum Laude.

She obtained her PhD in oncology and molecular pathology from the University of Cagliari in 2014. Her research project focused on the role of the nuclear thyroid hormone receptors (TRs) in hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) development and liver regeneration.

In 2015, she was awarded a postdoctoral fellowship by the French Association for Cancer Research (ARC). At the Cancer Research Center of Lyon (CRCL), she developed intestinal organoids (from transgenic mouse models and patients) to investigate the role of different intestinal stem cell populations in intestinal epithelial regeneration and resistance to chemotherapy. For her studies in 2018, she was awarded the Best Foreign Post-Doc Prize by the University of Lyon.

She is particularly interested in developing ex vivo human models reproducing as closely as possible the reality of diseases, believing that this is the most effective way to advance the understanding of pathologies and the development of new drugs.