Myriam Hemberger
Myriam Hemberger has located to Canada to take up a Professorship at the University of Calgary. Her new webpage can be found here. |
Research Summary
The focus of our work is on the establishment, maintenance and differentiation of trophoblast cells leading to formation of a functional placenta. The placenta is the defining organ of most mammals, providing a nutritive conduit that is crucial for all embryonic development to occur. Trophoblast cells are the major building blocks of the developing placenta. They are the first cell type to arise very early in development when they are set apart from cells giving rise to the embryo itself. The various functions of trophoblast cells early in development are vital for reproductive success, as they lay the foundations for a normal pregnancy and healthy foetus later on. A better understanding of the mechanisms underlying these early events will be critical to develop better screens and therapeutic avenues for pregnancy complications.
We are in particular interested in how the early trophoblast niche is regulated by transcription factors and specific epigenetic modifiers to ensure normal development. Leading on from this, we also investigate how susceptible the trophoblast compartment is to perturbations by extrinsic factors that activate specific signalling cascades, including in the context of development in mothers of advanced age. For this we are taking a range of high-throughput epigenomic and transcriptomic approaches to study these early events in placental development.
Key among our tools is the use of murine trophoblast stem (TS) cells, which mimic many of the properties of the early placenta. Learning about the self-renewal mechanisms of TS cells, in comparison to embryonic stem (ES) cells, will help us uncover the fundamental principles of how the early placenta develops and is influenced by external factors, which may be predictive for life long physiology and health. These insights will also enable us to better understand the earliest steps in human placentation and to develop novel cellular research tools to study the underlying molecular processes.
Latest Publications
Increased transcriptome variation and localised DNA methylation changes in oocytes from aged mice revealed by parallel single-cell analysis. Aging cell, 1, 1, 17 Nov 2020 PMID: 33201571 |
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TET1 and 5-Hydroxymethylation Preserve the Stem Cell State of Mouse Trophoblast. Stem cell reports, 1, 1, 13 May 2020
DOI:
10.1016/j.stemcr.2020.04.009
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Epigenetic changes occur at decidualisation genes as a function of reproductive ageing in mice. Development (Cambridge, England), 147, 6, 17 Mar 2020
DOI:
10.1242/dev.185629
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