Dear All

I would like to invite you to a seminar that we are organizing on the next Tuesday, September 13^th at 3pm in the CN Lecture Hall at the Nencki Institute.

We will host prof Thomas Graf, head of the Gene Regulation, Stem Cells and Cancer Laboratory at the Center for Genomic Regulation, Barcelona. Prof. Graf will give a lecture entitled: Mechanisms of transcription factor-induced cell fate conversions

Abstract

A central problem in developmental biology is how cell fates are specified. During differentiation cells are exposed to various signals from their microenvironment that ultimately result in the activation and/or repression of lineage instructive transcription factors (LiTFs). Defined combinations of LiTFs then regulate the expression of cell type specific programs, but how these factors rewire the cell’s transcriptome and epigenome during cell fate induction is still not completely understood. Our lab has been studying LiTF- induced cell fate conversions using C/EBPa as a paradigm. I will discuss how the factor converts B cells into macrophages and how the same factor also plays a role in enhancing Yamanaka factor-induced B cell reprogramming into iPS cells. Our results illuminate cell fate specification mechanisms during hematopoietic differentiation and early embryo development.

The lecture will be followed by a get together reception.

With best regards
Aleksandra Pękowska