Summary
Our group is interested in post-transcriptional regulation during embryo development and disease. In particular, we investigate how RNA-binding proteins (RBPs) regulate translation and how this is connected with general cell homeostasis and cancer progression. As RBPs are capable of binding hundreds of transcripts, their alterations often have widespread consequences in gene expression. In recent collaborative work, we have shown how general RBPs can cooperate to generate new RNA binding specificities (collaboration with Michael Sattler, TUM, Munich), and novel roles for the regulator UNR in X-chromosome dosage compensation (collaboration with Peter B Becker, LMU, Munich). We are currently extending this work, originally obtained in Drosophila, to human cells with the objective of identifying RBP networks important for cancer progression.
Research projects
- Molecular mechanisms of msl2 translational repression
- Role of RNA binding proteins in Drosophila X-chromosome dosage compensation
- Cytoplasmic polyadenylation in early Drosophila embryos
- RNA binding proteins and melanoma progression