CMCB Life Sciences Seminar: Dr. Marisa Karow, Friedrich-Alexander-University of Erlangen-Nürnberg

Host: Mareike Albert

Title: "Harnessing the power of organoids to understand early lineage choices during human brain development"

Abstract:

My research focuses on identifying new molecular targets not only for enhancing and navigating but also for correcting defective neurogenesis. The lab is integrating the strength of two complementary approaches to study the formation of human neurons, that is in forced and natural conditions. Through overexpression of neurogenic transcriptions factors neurogenesis is forced in non-neural brain-resident pericytes of the adult human cerebral cortex to obtain lineage conversion into induced neurons (iNs). The tools to investigate natural neurogenesis are centered around brain organoids. Brain organoids are furthermore used in several projects aiming at elucidating the molecular framework contributing to disease etiology of neurodevelopmental disorders.

Publications:

Karow M, Chavez CL, Farruggio AP, Geisinger JM, Keravala A, Jung WE, Lan F, Wu JC, Chen-Tsai Y, Calos MP. (2011). Site-specific recombinase strategy to create induced pluripotent stem cells efficiently with plasmid DNA. Stem Cells. 29(11):1696-704.

Karow M*, Sánchez R*, Schichor C, Masserdotti G, Ortega F, Heinrich C, Gascón S, Khan M, Lie DC, Dellavalle A, Cossu G, Goldbrunner R, Götz M, Berninger B. (2012). Reprogramming of pericyte-derived cells of the adult human brain into induced neuronal cells. Cell Stem Cell. 11(4):471-476.

Gascón S, Murenu E, Masserdotti G, Ortega F, Russo GL, Petrik D, Deshpande A, Heinrich C, Karow M, Robertson SP, Schroeder T, Beckers J, Irmler M, Berndt C, Angeli JP, Conrad M, Berninger B, Götz M. (2015) Identification and Successful Negotiation of a Metabolic Checkpoint in Direct Neuronal Reprogramming. Cell Stem Cell. 2016 Mar 3;18(3):396-409.

Karow M*#, Camp GJ*, Falk S, Gerber T, Pataskar A, Gac-Santel M, Kageyama J, Brazovskaja A, Garding A, Fan Wengiang, Riedemann T, Casamassa A, Schichor C, Götz M, Tiwari VK, Treutlein B, Berninger B. (2018) Direct pericyte-to-neuron reprogramming via unfolding of a neural stem cell-like program. Nat Neurosci. 2018 Jul;21(7):932-940

Herrero-Navarro A, Puche-Arcoa L, Moreno-Juan V, Sempere-Ferrandaz A, Espinosa A, Susin R, Torres-Masjoan L, Leyva-Diaz E, Karow M, Figueres-Onate M, Lopez-Macaraque L, Lopez-Atalaya J, Berninger B, Lopez-Bendito G. (2021) Astrocytes and neurons share brain-region specific transcriptional signatures that confer regional identity to neuronal reprogramming. SciAdv 2021 Apr 7;7(15)