The rockefeller university

Event Details

Type

Friday Lecture Series

Speaker(s)

Edith Heard, Ph.D., professor and chair, epigenetics and cellular memory, Collège de France; director, department of genetics and developmental biology, Institut Curie

Speaker bio(s)

X-chromosome inactivation during early female development is an essential epigenetic process that is required to achieve appropriate dosage for X-linked gene products. Dr. Heard’s laboratory is interested in understanding how the differential treatment of the two X chromosomes in the same nucleus is set up during development, and how this differential expression is then maintained or reversed in certain circumstances, such as the inner cell mass of the mouse embryo or in the germ line. The establishment of X inactivation involves the noncoding Xist RNA that triggers chromosome-wide chromatin reorganization and gene silencing. Recent insights have been made into the nature of these chromosome-wide changes and the factors that mediate them. However, little is known about the underlying mechanisms and, in particular, the degree to which 3-D X-chromosome structure is a cause or a consequence of gene expression. The Heard laboratory’s recent studies have focused on the degree to which organization into topologically associated domains (TADs) (1) influences monoallelic Xist regulation and (2) participates in regional escape from X inactivation on the inactive X chromosome.

 

Dr. Heard’s laboratory focuses on epigenetic processes in mammals, with a particular interest in X inactivation, chromosome biology, and the role of noncoding RNAs, chromatin structure, and nuclear organization, in the establishment and maintenance of differential expression patterns during development and in disease.

 

Dr. Heard is a British scientist working at the Institut Curie in Paris and professor of epigenetics and cellular memory at the Collège de France. She graduated from Cambridge University in 1986, specializing in genetics, and received her Ph.D. in biochemistry from the Imperial Cancer Research Fund, where she worked on gene amplification mechanisms in cancer. In 1990 she was a postdoc at the Pasteur Institute in Paris, where she began her studies on the epigenetic process of X-chromosome inactivation. She spent a year at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory in 2000 as a visiting scientist before moving to the Institut Curie in 2001, where she is currently director of the genetics and developmental biology department. She is the recipient of several honors, including the CNRS Silver Medal in 2008, the Jean Hamburger Award in 2009, the Grand Prix de la FRM in 2011, and a European Research Council Advanced Investigator Award in 2015. Dr. Heard is a member of the European Molecular Biology Organization (EMBO) and a fellow of the Royal Society.

Open to

Public

Host

Agata Smogorzewska, M.D., Ph.D.

Reception

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

Contact

Justin Sloboda

Phone

(212) 327-7785

Sponsor

Justin Sloboda
(212) 327-7785
jsloboda@rockefeller.edu