Woodring Wright

Woodring Wright has made major contributions to understanding telomere shortening as a tumor suppression mechanism and cellular senescence in cancer. He pioneered studies on the alternative lengthening of telomeres (ALT) pathway used by a subset of cancers to maintain telomeres without telomerase. His collaborative work with Jerry Shay defined the relationship between telomere dysfunction and chromosomal instability in cancer. He has also studied how senescence bypass contributes to malignant transformation.