Luciano Di Croce

Luciano Di Croce has made milestone contributions to understanding how Polycomb repressive complexes PRC1 and PRC2 silence tumor suppressor genes and maintain cancer cell stemness, particularly through his discovery that the PML-RARa fusion oncoprotein in acute promyelocytic leukemia recruits Polycomb complexes to target gene promoters, establishing a direct mechanistic link between oncogenic fusion proteins and Polycomb-mediated epigenetic silencing. He has characterized bivalent chromatin domains marked by both H3K27me3 and H3K4me3 at developmental genes in cancer stem cells, revealing how epigenetic poising maintains differentiation potential while blocking terminal differentiation. His work on H2AK119 ubiquitination by PRC1 has illuminated the hierarchical relationship between Polycomb complexes in cancer gene regulation.