Teams publications

Diseases caused by Leishmania and Trypanosoma parasites are a major health problem in tropical countries. Due to their complex life cycle involving both vertebrate and insect hosts, and >1 billion years of evolutionarily distance, the cell biology of trypanosomatid parasites exhibits pronounced differences to animal cells. For example, the actin…

Morphogenesis and cell state transitions must be coordinated in time and space to produce a functional tissue. An excellent paradigm to understand the coupling of these processes is mammalian hair follicle development, which is initiated by the formation of an epithelial invagination-termed placode-that coincides with the emergence of a designated…

CONCLUSIONS: Our findings reveal a role for AmotL2 and nuclear-cytoskeletal force transmission in modulating the epigenetic and transcriptional regulation of YAP to maintain a mechano-enforced positive feedback loop of vascular homeostasis. These findings may offer an explanation as to the proinflammatory phenotype that leads to aneurysm formation observed in AmotL2…

Fibroblast growth factor 2 (FGF2) exits cells by direct translocation across the plasma membrane, a type I pathway of unconventional protein secretion. This process is initiated by phosphatidylinositol-4,5-bisphosphate (PI(4,5)P(2))-dependent formation of highly dynamic FGF2 oligomers at the inner plasma membrane leaflet, inducing the formation of lipidic membrane pores. Cell surface…

Over the past decade, there has been a significant rise in the use of vaping devices, particularly among adolescents, raising concerns for effects on respiratory health. Pressingly, many recent vaping-related lung injuries are unexplained by current knowledge, and the overall implications of vaping for respiratory health are poorly understood. This…

Familial cardiomyopathy in pediatric stages is a poorly understood presentation of heart disease in children that is attributed to pathogenic mutations. Through exome sequencing, we report a homozygous variant in tropomodulin 1 (TMOD1; c.565C>T, p.R189W) in three individuals from two unrelated families with childhood-onset dilated and restrictive cardiomyopathy. To decipher…

The cell nucleus is continuously exposed to external signals, of both chemical and mechanical nature. To ensure proper cellular response, cells need to regulate not only the transmission of these signals, but also their timing and duration. Such timescale regulation is well described for fluctuating chemical signals, but if and…

Despite strong indications that interactions between melanoma and lymphatic vessels actively promote melanoma progression, the molecular mechanisms are not yet completely understood. To characterize molecular factors of this crosstalk, we established human primary lymphatic endothelial cell (LEC) cocultures with human melanoma cell lines. Here, we show that coculture with melanoma…

The skin epidermis is constantly renewed throughout life^(1,2). Disruption of the balance between renewal and differentiation can lead to uncontrolled growth and tumour initiation³. However, the ways in which oncogenic mutations affect the balance between renewal and differentiation and lead to clonal expansion, cell competition, tissue colonization and tumour development…