IMOL - Key Persons

Job Titles:

• Group Leader
• Head of the Laboratory of Onco
• Research Interest

Anna Marusiak is a head of The Laboratory of OncoSignalling. After graduating from the University of Wrocław in medical biotechnology, she completed the PhD course in CRUK Growth Factor Group at the University of Birmingham under the supervision of Prof. John Heath. During 2011-2015 she was a postdoctoral fellow at the Cancer Research UK Manchester Institute in Signalling Networks in Cancer Group led by Dr John Brognard. In 2015 she joined Prof. Dominika Nowis's (Laboratory of Experimental Medicine) at the Centre of New Technologies, University of Warsaw. She was a project leader of three grants (Fuga, Homing, Sonata). In August 2021, she became a group leader at IMol PAS.

Job Titles:

• Group Leader
• Research Interest

Dr. Abdelhalim Azzi completed his PhD in 2014 under the supervision of Prof. Steven A. Brown at the University of Zurich, Switzerland where he studied the role of epigenetic modifications, i.e., DNA methylation in regulation of circadian behaviour under different light/dark cycles. He then joined the laboratory of Prof. Stéphane Schurmans at the GIGA research center in Belgium as a visiting scientist where he studied the role of phosphoinositide phosphatase SHIP2 in regulation of apoptosis. He then joined the laboratory of Prof. Xu Wu as a research fellow at the Massachusetts General Hospital, Harvard Medical School, USA where he studied the crosstalk between the hippo signaling pathway and circadian clock. He joined IMOL in 2021 as principal investigator.

Job Titles:

• Group Leader
• Research Interests

Dr. Karolina Szczepanowska completed her Ph.D. in 2011 under the supervision of Francoise Foury at the University of Louvain, where she studied the mechanism entangled in mitochondrial genome maintenance. Next, she joined the lab of Aleksandra Trifunovic at the University of Cologne and Cluster of Excellence Cellular Stress Responses in Aging-Associated Disease. Her postdoctoral research focused on dissecting the secrets of mitochondrial protein homeostasis and quality control in mice, tissue cultures, and worms using advanced proteomic and biochemical approaches. In 2021 she established her research group at the ReMedy/IMol PAS.

Job Titles:

• Group Leader
• Research Interests

Dr. Maciej Cieśla has a shared MD and PhD degree from the Jagiellonian University in Poland. For his post-doctoral training with Dr. Cristian Bellodi at Lund Stem Cell Center in Sweden, he studied how splicing factors are controlled at the level of mRNA translation during oncogenic stress. His research focus revolves around understanding of the post-transcriptional gene regulatory networks during cell fate transitions, such as stem cell activation or initial steps of cancerogenesis. In 2021 he joined the ReMedy/IMol PAS to study regulation of splicing in stem cells.

Job Titles:

• Group Leader
• Research Interest

Dr. Piotr Gerlach joined ReMedy IRAP at the International Institute of Molecular Mechanisms and Machines (IMol) in summer 2021. During his PhD in Dr. Stephen Cusack's group at EMBL in Grenoble, he succeeded in determining the first atomic structure of a bunyaviral polymerase. Securing an EMBO Long Term Fellowship, he joined prof. Elena Conti's lab at Max Planck Institute of Biochemistry in Munich, where he studied the human RNA exosome using cryo-EM. Recently, dr. Gerlach has received an EMBO Installation Grant to set up his research team at IMol.

Job Titles:

• CEITEC - Central European Institute of Technology, Czech Republic

Job Titles:

• Group Leader
• Deputy Director for Science
• Head of Re
• Research Interests
• Wellcome Trust Centre for Mitochondrial Research, Newcastle, UK

Gornicka, A., Bragoszewski, P., Chroscicki, P., Wenz, L.S., Schulz, C., Rehling, P., Chacinska, A. (2014). A discrete pathway for the transfer of intermembrane space proteins across the outer membrane of mitochondria . Mol Biol Cell 25, 3999-4009. Stojanovski, D., Bragoszewski, P., and Chacinska, A. (2012). The MIA pathway: A tight bond between protein transport and oxidative folding in mitochondria. Biochim Biophys Acta 1823, 1142-1150. Hutu, D.P., Guiard, B., Chacinska, A., Becker, D., Pfanner, N., Rehling, P., van der Laan, M. (2008). Mitochondrial protein import motor: differential role of Tim44 in the recruitment of Pam17 and J-complex to the presequence translocase. Mol Biol Cell 19, 2642-2649. Rospert, S., and Chacinska, A. (2006). Distinct yet linked: chaperone networks in the eukaryotic cytosol. van der Laan, M.*, Chacinska, A.*, Lind, M., Perschil, I., Sickmann, A., Meyer, H.E., Guiard, B., Meisinger, C., Pfanner, N., and Rehling, P. (2005). Pam17 is required for architecture and translocation activity of the mitochondrial protein import motor. Mol Cell Biol 25, 7449-7458 (*equal contribution). Chacinska, A., and Rehling, P. (2004). Moving proteins from the cytosol into mitochondria. Biochem Soc Trans 32, 774-776. Frazier, A.E., Chacinska, A., Truscott, K.N., Guiard, B., Pfanner, N., and Rehling, P. (2003). Mitochondria use different mechanisms for transport of multispanning membrane proteins through the intermembrane space. Mol Cell Biol 23, 7818-7828. Pfanner, N. and Chacinska, A. (2002). The mitochondrial import machinery: preprotein-conducting channels with binding sites for presequences. Biochim Biophys Acta 1592, 15-24. Prof. Agnieszka Chacinska is head of ReMedy IRAP and director of the International Institute of Molecular Mechanisms and Machines PAS, IMol. She received a PhD from the Institute of Biochemistry and Biophysics PAS with Prof. Magdalena Boguta and post-doctoral training with Prof. Nikolaus Pfanner, followed by a junior group leader position at the University of Freiburg, Germany. Subsequently, in 2009 she established a Laboratory of Mitochondrial Biogenesis at the International Institute of Molecular and Cell Biology in Warsaw, which In 2017 she moved to CeNT UW, and currently transfers to IMol. She is a corresponding member of PAS, a member of EMBO and Academia Europaea.

Job Titles:

• Deputy Director
• Group Leader
• Deputy Director of Re
• M.M. P54nrb Associates
• Research Interest

Kameoka, S., Duque, P., and Konarska, M.M. p54nrb associates with the 5' splice site within large transcription/splicing complexes. EMBO J. 23, 1782-1791 (2004). Siatecka, M., Reyes, J.L., and Konarska, M.M., Functional interactions of Prp8 with both splice sites at the spliceosomal catalytic center. Genes & Dev. 13:1983-1993 (1999). Konarska, M.M. Analysis of splicing complexes and snRNP particles by native gel electrophoresis. Methods in Enzymology, vol.180, chapter 30, p.442-453 (1989). Konarska, M.M. and Sharp, P.A. Electrophoretic separation of complexes involved in the splicing of precursors to mRNAs. Cell 46, 845-855 (1986). Filipowicz, W., Strugala, K., Konarska, M.M. and Shatkin, A.J. Cyclization of RNA 3'- terminal phosphate by cyclase from HeLa cells proceeds via formation of N(3')pp(5')A activated intermediate. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 82, 1316-1320 (1985). Padgett, R.A., Konarska, M.M., Aebi, M., Hornig, H., Weissmann, C. and Sharp, P.A. Nonconsensus branch-site sequences in the in vitro splicing of transcripts of mutant rabbit beta-globin genes. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 82, 8349-8353 (1985). Prof. Magda Konarska is deputy director of ReMedy IRAP and deputy director for science of the International Institute of Molecular Mechanisms and Machines PAS, IMol. Following PhD at the Institute of Biochemistry and Biophysics PAS with prof. Witold Filipowicz and post-doctoral training with prof. Phillip A. Sharp at MIT, for over 25 years she led a Laboratory of Molecular Biology and Biochemistry at the Rockefeller University in New York. In 2015 she formed a Laboratory of RNA Biology at CeNT UW, later on transferred to IMol. She is a corresponding member of PAS and a member of EMBO and Academia Europaea.

Job Titles:

• Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Job Titles:

• Department of Neuro and Sensory Physiology, University Medical Center Göttingen, Germany

Job Titles:

• VICE CHAIR

Tyc, K., Kikuchi, Y., Konarska, M.M., Filipowicz, W. and Gross, H.J. Ligation of endogenous tRNA 3'-half molecules to their corresponding 5'-halves via 2'- phosphomonoester, 3',5'- phosphodiester bonds in extracts of Chlamydomonas. EMBO J. 2, 605-610 (1983). Konarska, M.M., Filipowicz, W., Domdey, H. and Gross, H.J. Formation of a 2'-phosphomonoester, 3',5'-phosphodiester linkage by a novel RNA ligase in wheat germ. Nature (London) 293, 112-116