Joanna Wysocka

Honors and Awards

• New Faculty Award, California Institute for Regenerative Medicine (2008-2013)
• Searle Scholar, Chicago Community Trust (2007-2010)
• Faculty Scholar, Baxter Foundation (2007)
• Terman Fellowship, Fredrick E. Terman Foundation (2006-2009)
• Postdoctoral Fellowship, Damon Runyon Cancer Research Foundation (2004-2006)

Professional Education

Postdoctoral Advisees

Ruchi Bajpai , Ziyang Ma , Kazutaka Murata , Jamy Peng , Alvaro Rada Iglesias

Graduate & Fellowship Program Affiliations

• Developmental Biology
• Chemical and Systems Biology

Web Site Links

• CSB profile

Research Interests

EPIGENETIC REGULATION OF DIFFERENTIATION AND DEVELOPMENT

The biological question that is driving our research in the long-term is understanding the epigenetic basis of vertebrate development and differentiation. Although each cell of a multicellular organism is a progeny of a single zygote, and shares the same genetic information with every other cell, cells differentiate to specialized forms such as skin, muscle or nervous cells. Thus, new information emerges during development, and is inherited in a way that does not involve changes in DNA sequence. This fascinating process is called epigenesis. Epigenetic changes underlie not only normal, but also pathological development. Abnormal transmission of epigenetic information contributes to human pathology, such as aging, cancer, degenerative diseases, developmental defects and mental retardation.

In the last decade evidence emerged that a substantial portion of epigenetic information is transmitted in a form of chemical modifications of histones and associated DNA. Our research focuses on understanding the mechanistic basis by which covalent histone modifications regulate gene expression patterns during vertebrate development and differentiation. In particular, we are focusing on characterizing enzymatic activities responsible for "writing" the methyl mark on histones, called histone methyltransferases, as well as on downstream effectors, or "readers", which recognize the methyl marks and translate them into specific biological outcomes. The outstanding questions we are trying to address are: How are methylation patterns established? How do methyltransferases connect to the signaling pathways? What are their roles in regulating development and how did they functionally specialize during vertebrate evolution?

A second major area of our interest involves chromatin regulation in embryonic stem cells (ESCs), molecular basis of pluripotency and role of histone methyltransferases...

Publications

• H3K27 demethylases, at long last. Swigut T, Wysocka J. Cell. 2007; 131 (1): 29-32
• E2F activation of S phase promoters via association with HCF-1 and the MLL family of histone H3K4 methyltransferases. Tyagi S, Chabes AL, Wysocka J, Herr W. Mol Cell. 2007; 27 (1): 107-19
• Methylation of lysine 4 on histone H3: intricacy of writing and reading a single epigenetic mark. Ruthenburg AJ, Allis CD, Wysocka J. Mol Cell. 2007; 25 (1): 15-30
• A PHD finger of NURF couples histone H3 lysine 4 trimethylation with chromatin remodelling. Wysocka J, Swigut T, Xiao H, Milne TA, Kwon SY, Landry J, Kauer M, Tackett AJ, Chait BT, Badenhorst P, Wu C, Allis CD. Nature. 2006; 442 (7098): 86-90
• WDR5 associates with histone H3 methylated at K4 and is essential for H3 K4 methylation and vertebrate development. Wysocka J, Swigut T, Milne TA, Dou Y, Zhang X, Burlingame AL, Roeder RG, Brivanlou AH, Allis CD. Cell. 2005; 121 (6): 859-72