[FPI2019] Biomedicina

We are seeking a highly motivated candidate to join us on a wide project within the frame of a Grant entitled “The complexity of epithelial plasticity: Implications in health, disease and therapeutic approaches“.The EMT is crucial for the formation of multiple tissues and organs during embryonic development and it is reactivated in the adult during wound healing, tumor progression and organ degeneration. We use zebrafish, mouse and chick embryos as model systems together with cultured cells and samples from patients, and we have a high interest in Cell Biology,

We study cell plasticity in health and disease, and in particular the epithelial to mesenchymal transition (EMT). The EMT is crucial for the formation of multiple tissues and organs during embryonic development and it is reactivated in the adult during wound healing, tumor progression and organ degeneration. We use zebrafish, mouse and chick embryos as model systems together with cultured cells and samples from patients, and we have a high interest in Cell Biology, Evo-Devo, Biomedicine, and state-of-the-art imaging, transgenesis and gene expression profiling. This project is devoted to the study of embryonic development, cancer and fibrosis in animal models with the final aim of designing better therapeutic strategies.

Selected references:
- Ocaña, et al. (2012) Metastatic colonization requires the repression of the epithelial-mesenchymal transition inducer Prrx1. Cancer Cell 22, 709-724.
- Grande et al. (2015). Snail1-induced partial epithelial-to-mesenchymal transition drives renal fibrosis in mice and can be targeted to reverse established disease. Nature Medicine 21, 989-997.  
- Nieto et al. (2016). EMT: 2016. Cell 166, 21-45.
- Ocaña et al. (2017). A right-handed signalling pathway drives heart looping in vertebrates. Nature 549, 86-90 (DOI 10.1038/nature23454)
- Rago et al. (2019). MicroRNAs establish the right-handed dominance of the heart laterality pathway in vertebrates. Dev Cell in press.

The Instituto de Neurociencias holds the Severo Ochoa Excellence Award from the Ministry of Science, Innovation and Universities. This is a very prestigious and competitive award offered by the Government to 25 Institutes/centers  in Spain spanning all scientific research areas, from Humanities and Social Sciences to Astrophysics and Biomedicine.  

Interested candidates with good academic marks and English level, please send a letter of motivation describing the interest in our project together with a full CV and two contacts for reference letters.

Contact by e-mail
Prof. M. Angela Nieto
Instituto de Neurociencias, CSIC-UMH
Tel: 34-965919243  e-mail: anieto@umh.es