Dr Ashray Gunjur

Postdoctoral clinical research fellow

Ashray is a consultant medical oncologist in the melanoma service at Addenbrooke's Hospital, as well as a post-doctoral researcher in the Adams Group and Lawley Lab at The Sanger.

Post-doctoral research focus

Pancreatic and biliary tract adenocarcinomas are usually diagnosed at a late stage, with limited treatment options and a poor prognosis. Better biomarkers to diagnose these diseases early, and guide more effective treatment strategies, are desperately needed.

There is now emerging evidence that gut microbiota- micro-organisms (predominantly bacteria) residing in the gastro-intestinal tract- are involved in the development of both pancreatic and biliary tract adenocarcinomas. Furthermore, they appear to affect their response to treatments (such as chemotherapy, or more recently, immunotherapy), as well as the development of complications such as cancer-associated cachexia (a syndrome of weight, particularly muscle-mass loss, despite adequate nutritional intake).

As such, Ashray’s post-doctoral research focuses on defining the specific microbiota involved in pancreato-biliary cancers, to ultimately develop microbiome-directed strategies to improve patient outcomes.

Only selected publications are featured below. For a full list, please see Ashray’s google scholar page.

My timeline

• Commenced substantive consultant medical oncologist post at Addenbrooke's Hospital and post-doctoral research fellowship at The Sanger.

• Submitted PhD thesis (successfully defended in February 2025)

• Commenced PhD at The Sanger (University of Cambridge)

• Awarded Fellowship of the Royal Australasian College of Physicians (medical oncology)

• Graduated from the University of Melbourne (MBBS (hons) BMedSci)