Dean Bacich, Ph.D.

Dr. Bacich received his Honors degree in Obstetrics and Gynecology in 1990 and his Graduate degree, also in Obstetrics and Gynecology in 1997 from the University of Adelaide in Australia.  He completed post-doctoral fellowships in 1999 at the Sloan-Kettering Institute for Cancer Research within the Departments of Surgery and Urology, and at the Cleveland Clinic in the Department of Cancer Biology in 2002, before being recruited to The University of Pittsburg in the Department of Urology as an Assistant Professor in 2003.  He joined the faculty in the Department of Urology at the University of Health Science Center San Antonio (UTHSCSA) in 2014 as an Associate Professor.   Dr. Bacich’ s research focuses on prostate cancer, specifically Prostate Specific Membrane Antigen (PSMA), which is a unique folate hydrolase that is highly expressed in prostate cancer.  The folate hydrolase activity spurred his interest in the effect of folate on prostate cancer initiation and progression. This area of research is particularly relevant given the requirement for folate for cancer cell division as well as it being required for genomic stability and methylation reactions, thus it can have positive or negative consequences depending on the stage of the cancer, and yet patient intake of folate can be easily modified by dietary modification. This, in turn, has led to his interest in how folate levels modulate FASN expression and regulation, and the potential interaction of folate with FASN’s nuclear localization.   His research has also diversified to examining and targeting the expression of PSMA in the vasculature of Renal tumors, as well as the role that PSMA has on urinary incontinence in diabetes.