Ally Freedy

Internal Medicine resident @CU_medicine, MD PhD @HarvardMITmdphd, PhD @liaulab. Passionate about oncology, drug resistance and women in science and medicine.

[Ally Freedy @AllyFreedy]

Check these amazing preprints from my PhD lab, @liaulab! Congrats to @applecannon23, Olivia, @clee_bio, @Palgosavi, @proteinnns and @brian_b_liau! Truly a tour de force of chemical biology!

[Brian Liau @brian_b_liau]

Excited to share 2 preprints, together showing how mechanisms of a molecular glue & E3 ligase cancer mutations serendipitously converge to cause neomorphic protein degradation in distinct contexts. Highlights below: 1/17
#1: https://t.co/8UA8tJ2iti
#2: https://t.co/QOgfdXaxW7

[Ally Freedy @AllyFreedy]

@HarvardWIC Congratulations Nina!!

[Ally Freedy @AllyFreedy]

Check out my Tweet thread below on the preprint for a quick summary of the paper! https://t.co/3uxIWpzlrx

[Ally Freedy @AllyFreedy]

Epigenetic dysregulation is a cancer hallmark. Restoring the benign epigenetic state is effective therapeutically, but what about pushing tumors further into epigenetic dysregulation? Check out our preprint out @biorxiv from @liaulab to learn more! https://t.co/0qGA1qKEBh

[Ally Freedy @AllyFreedy]

Excited to share that our paper discovering drug addiction to PRC2 inhibitors is out at @nchembio! Congrats to my co-lead author, Hui Si Kwok, and the @liaulab PRC2 team including Allison Siegenfeld, Julia Morriss, @proteinnns, @StephenKissler and @brian_b_liau! We did it!

[Nature Chemical Biology @nchembio]

A new paper from @brian_b_liau, @AllyFreedy @liaulab profiled the resistance landscape to PRC2 inhibitors in EZH2-mutant lymphoma with CRISPR suppressor scanning revealing drug addiction mutations and a repressive methylation ceiling. Free to read link at https://t.co/sXjuTLmj9z

[Ally Freedy @AllyFreedy]

We're honored that our work was featured in a News and Views authored by Tyler Reich, @thePeterLewis and @PeterLewisLab. Thank you for the broader perspective on our work! https://t.co/MuompCXOrp

[Ally Freedy @AllyFreedy]

Thank you @SchreiberStuart! I would not have become the scientist I am today without your example, support and mentorship over all of these years. Thank you for opening the door to chemistry and chemical biology to me and so many other women scientists!

[Stuart Schreiber @SchreiberStuart]

Physician–scientist in training Ally Freedy after receiving the second annual Award in Scientific Excellence at the 2022 Broad Retreat. In recognition of her discoveries chromatin biology and their potential for novel medicines. Bravo!

[Ally Freedy @AllyFreedy]

@HarvardWIC Thank you @HarvardWIC! I made sure to give @HarvardWIC a shoutout at the Broad retreat :) A huge shoutout to everyone who has made all of HWIC’s initiatives so successful!

[Ally Freedy @AllyFreedy]

@brian_b_liau Thank you so much @brian_b_liau and @liaulab! I would not be the scientist I am today without all of your support and guidance over all of these years!

[Zarko Boskovic @djavko]

I want to share an inspiring teaching experience I had this semester. I had a privilege to teach biochemistry to Emily @PharmFatale who can’t see the structures like you and I can. At first I was skeptical cause I thought that chemistry is highly visual.

[Ally Freedy @AllyFreedy]

Congratulations to @nicklue8, @Emma_M_Garcia_1 and the the DNMT3A team @liaulab! Check out this paper for a tour de force in base editing tiling mutagenesis combined with an activity based reporter all followed up with rigorous cellular and biochemical validation!

[Nicholas Lue @nicklue8]

Our paper on DNMT3A base editor scanning is out in @nchembio!! Check it out if you like DNA methylation, base editor screens, and protein biochemistry. Super thankful to my amazing PI (@brian_b_liau), labmates (@liaulab), and especially my teammate @Emma_M_Garcia_1.

[Ally Freedy @AllyFreedy]

Congratulations @StephenKissler!! @CUBoulder is so lucky to have you!

[Ally Freedy @AllyFreedy]

Incredible work from @liaulab led by Allison Siegenfeld and Shelby Roseman developing a new method called LIMe-Hi-C to discover Polycomb-Lamina antagonism! Congratulations all!!

[Brian Liau @brian_b_liau]

Today we share in @NatureComms our method called LIMe-Hi-C (Lamina-Inducible Methylation and Hi-C) & how we used it to uncover Polycomb-Lamina antagonism. Big thanks to Allison, Shelby, @MartinAryee, and @liaulab, & to reviewer 1 for the detailed comments. https://t.co/Eu6qbJqJcP

[Ally Freedy @AllyFreedy]

@MilkaKostic Thank you Milka! It’s been great working with you over the years growing the Chem Bio community in Boston. Looking forward to see all that is in store for the community!

[Ally Freedy @AllyFreedy]

@SchreiberStuart Thank you Stuart! It’s been a pleasure to serve the CCB community and can’t wait to see what the future holds for the department!

[Harvard Women+ in Chemistry @HarvardWIC]

Today we're thrilled to bring you a special spotlight of one of our HWIC x Harvard Chem Club pairings!

"We never stop being a mentee and it's never too early to be a mentor" -@jenheemstra

Read more about Olivia and Christie at https://t.co/8as9wPak4B

[Nicholas Lue @nicklue8]

Super excited to announce that we’ve just submitted the latest @liaulab ~manuscript~! Tldr: we used base editors + a methylation reporter to do a mutational scan of DNMT3A, a key cancer gene. Highlights below, but check out our preprint at @biorxiv!

https://t.co/BDkaMnbAxM

[Ally Freedy @AllyFreedy]

@AppleHelix Thanks for the question! Side effects are always an issue with anti-cancer therapies and are studied very carefully in clinical trials. Clinical trials have shown that EZH2 inhibitors have a low risk of causing cancer in normal cells! This needs to be studied for SETD2i as well!

[Ally Freedy @AllyFreedy]

Epigenetic dysregulation is a cancer hallmark. Restoring the benign epigenetic state is effective therapeutically, but what about pushing tumors further into epigenetic dysregulation? Check out our preprint out @biorxiv from @liaulab to learn more! https://t.co/0qGA1qKEBh

[Ally Freedy @AllyFreedy]

@dkjhaunc b) To your second question, EZH2i has been suggested to be effective in H3K27M contexts so that suggests the meltdown may work in that reverse direction. As for the SETD2 mut context, I'm not sure! Also a good thing to try :) https://t.co/MA9B1ZSwKZ

[Ally Freedy @AllyFreedy]

@dkjhaunc Thanks so much Deepak! These are great questions. a) We haven't looked into it yet, but are curious to try SETD2i and look for resistance through hypermethylation mechanisms in sarcoma/SwiSnf mutant contexts generally. It's definitely on the list!

[Ally Freedy @AllyFreedy]

Caveat: this work is pre-print and not yet peer reviewed! Please treat as preliminary. We welcome all constructive comments and questions!

[Ally Freedy @AllyFreedy]

This work was a huge team effort co-led by me and Hui Si Kwok! We could not be more thankful to Allison Siegenfeld, @proteinnns, Julia Morriss, @StephenKissler, @brian_b_liau and the whole PRC2 team!