The rockefeller university

Event Details

Type

Friday Lecture Series

Speaker(s)

Emmanuelle Charpentier, Ph.D., professor, department of regulation in infection biology, director, Max Planck Institute for Infection Biology; visiting professor, Laboratory for Molecular Infection Medicine Sweden, Ume University

Speaker bio(s)

The RNA-programmable CRISPR-Cas9 system has recently emerged as a transformative technology in biological sciences, allowing rapid and efficient targeted genome editing, chromosomal marking, and gene regulation in a large variety of cells and organisms. In this system, the endonuclease Cas9 or catalytically inactive Cas9 variants are programmed with single guide RNAs (sgRNAs) to target site-specifically any DNA sequence of interest given the presence of a short sequence (Protospacer Adjacent Motif, PAM) juxtaposed to the complementary region between the sgRNA and target DNA.

 

Originally, CRISPR-Cas is an RNA-mediated adaptive immune system that protects bacteria and archaea from invading mobile genetic elements. Short crRNA (CRISPR RNA) molecules containing unique genome-targeting spacers guide Cas protein(s) to invading cognate nucleic acids to affect their maintenance. CRISPR-Cas has been classified into three main types and further subtypes. CRISPR-Cas9 originates from the type II system that has evolved unique molecular mechanisms for maturation of crRNAs and targeting of invading DNA, which Dr. Charpentier's laboratory has identified in the human pathogen Streptococcus pyogenes. During the step of crRNA biogenesis, a unique CRISPR-associated RNA, tracrRNA, base pairs with the repeats of precursor-crRNA to form anti-repeat-repeat dual-RNAs that are cleaved by RNase III in the presence of Cas9, generating mature tracrRNA and intermediate forms of crRNAs. Following a second maturation event, the mature dual-tracrRNA-crRNAs guide Cas9 to cleave cognate target DNA and thereby affect the maintenance of invading genomes. Dr. Charpentier has shown that Cas9 can be programmed with sgRNAs mimicking the natural dual-tracrRNA-crRNAs to target site-specifically any DNA sequence of interest. She will discuss the biological roles of CRISPR-Cas9, the mechanisms involved, the evolution of type II CRISPR-Cas components in bacteria, and the applications of CRISPR-Cas9 as a novel genome engineering technology.

 

Dr. Charpentier is recognized as a world-leading expert in regulatory mechanisms underlying processes of infection and immunity in bacterial pathogens. Her work has led to a number of seminal discoveries and insights into pathways governing antibiotic resistance and virulence of bacterial pathogens. With her recent groundbreaking findings in the field of RNA-mediated regulation based on the CRISPR-Cas9 system, Dr. Charpentier has laid the foundation for the development of a novel, highly versatile and specific genome editing technology that is revolutionizing life sciences research and could open up whole new opportunities in biomedical gene therapies. 

 

Dr. Charpentier studied biochemistry, microbiology, and genetics at the University Pierre and Marie Curie, Paris, and obtained her Ph.D. in microbiology for research performed at the Pasteur Institute. She conducted postdoctoral work at The Rockefeller University (in the lab of Elaine Tuomanen), NYU Langone Medical Center and the Skirball Institute of Biomolecular Medicine, and at St Jude Children's Research Hospital. She established her own research group at the Max F. Perutz Laboratories of the University of Vienna in Austria, and was then appointed associate professor at the Laboratory for Molecular Infection Medicine Sweden at Umeå University. Between 2013 and 2015, Dr. Charpentier was head of the department of regulation in infection biology at the Helmholtz Centre for Infection Research, Braunschweig, and professor at the Medical School of Hannover in Germany. In 2015, she was appointed scientific member of the Max Planck Society in Germany and director at the Max Planck Institute for Infection Biology in Berlin.

 

Dr. Charpentier is a recipient of the HFSP Nakasone Award, the Massry Prize, the Otto Warburg Medal, the L’Oréal-UNESCO For Women in Science Award, the Carus-Medal of the German National Academy of Sciences Leopoldina, the Gruber Prize in Genetics, the Hansen Family Award, the Louis Jeantet Prize for Medicine, the Ernst Jung Prize for Medicine, the Breakthrough Prize in Life Sciences, the Dr. Paul Janssen Award, the Göran Gustafsson Prize, and the Eric K. Fernström Prize, among other honors. She is a member of the Swedish and German National Academies of Sciences.

Open to

Public

Host

Luciano Marraffini, Ph.D.

Reception

Refreshments, 3:15 p.m. - 3:45 p.m., Abby Lounge

Contact

Linda Hanssler

Phone

(212) 327-7714

Sponsor

Linda Hanssler
(212) 327-7714
lhanssler@rockefeller.edu

Readings

http://librarynews.rockefeller.edu/?p=3959