Regulation of gastrointestinal homeostasis and transformation by Polycomb proteins, MYC and WNT signaling

Diego Pasini was born in 1977 in Milan. He graduated from the University of Milan at the Faculty of Biological Sciences in 2002 and he joined the European Institute of Oncology (IEO) first as research assistant and then as a PhD student (Open University, London) in the laboratory of Prof. Kristian Helin. When Prof. Helin moved to Denmark to assume the direction of the new Biotech Research and Innovation Center (BRIC) of the University of Copenhagen, Diego Pasini followed him in his new laboratory where he obtained his Ph.D. in 2006. Since then, he continued his collaboration in the Helin’s laboratory first as post-doctorate and then as an assistant professor at BRIC. In 2010 he moved back to Italy to start his independent laboratory as junior Group Leader at the department of experimental oncology of IEO. Since January 2015 he became tenured Group Leader at IEO and was elected EMBO Young Investigator. In 2017 he was awarded of an ERC Consolidator grant In March 2018 he first became Associate Professor at the Department of Health Sciences (DiSS) of the University of Milan and turned Full Professor in 2022. In 2019 he won of the Chiara D’Onofrio senior award while in 2021 he was elected EMBO member. 

Abstract:

Establishing and maintaining cellular identities involves multiple signals that instruct the activity of transcription factors and chromatin-remodeling activities to define cellular transcriptional states. Such control mechanisms play crucial roles in human pathologies and are directly implicated in the development of cancer. Indeed, the deregulation of chromatin remodeling activities via genetic and epigenetic alterations are very frequent causative events.

The seminar will be focused on transcriptional and chromatin modifying mechanisms that control gastrointestinal stem-cell maintenance, homeostasis and neoplastic transformation. This will involve both the mechanisms by which the Polycomb repressive machinery control intestinal stem-cell activity and tissue homeostasis regulating H2AK119ub1 and H3K27me3 as well as the underlying mechanism of an oncogenic cooperation between MYC and WNT signaling in the development of gastric cancers.