Giacomo Cavalli

Giacomo Cavalli demonstrated that Polycomb group proteins establish heritable chromatin states through 3D genome organization, creating topologically associating domains that serve as units of epigenetic memory transmitted through cell division and exploited by cancer cells for stable silencing of tumor suppressor gene clusters. His discovery that Polycomb-mediated epigenetic memory can be inherited through DNA replication independent of DNA methylation revealed an alternative epigenetic memory system disrupted in cancer. His work on 3D chromatin architecture in cancer showed how Polycomb domain reorganization creates new enhancer-promoter contacts activating oncogenes.