Molecular Physiology of the Cell

Elie Saliba, Christos Gournas and Bruno André attended the “Cell Biology of Yeasts” meeting organized at the Cold Spring Harbour Lab congress center (Nov 3-7, 2015). Christos was invited to present a talk at the “Membrane traffic” session about his work on the role of arrestin-like adaptors in ubiquitylation of membrane transporters. We could enjoy top science and the beautiful Fall colors of the campus (see pictures below). This year the Cold Spring Harbor lab celebrated its 125th anniversary.

We are pleased to announce that the lab has hired Simon LISSOIR as a new technician. Simon obtained his diploma in 2011 at the “Haute Ecole de Louvain en Hainaut” (Fleurus). After an internship at GSK, he was then hired by the “Agence Régionale de Santé et d’Identification Animale”. Simon now joined the lab thanks to a new four-year grant from the FNRS.

 

 

We are pleased to welcome a new pregraduate student, Martin Van Vlasselaer, who will  carry out his master thesis in the lab. During his thesis, Martin will use yeast as a model system to address specific questions relevant for the study of cystinosis, a rare genetic disease caused by mutations in the gene encoding the lysosomal cystine exporter.

Christos Gournas attended a top-level meeting organized in Münster (Germany) by Roland Wedlich-Söldner and Joost Holthuis on “Mechanisms and Functions of Membrane Compartmentalization” (6-10 September). Christos presented a poster reporting his recent data about the regulation of heterogenous distribution of the Can1 permease at the plasma membrane.

Some news about students who joined or will soon join the lab :

Nathan Fraikin (ULB, master in Biochemistry and Molecular and Cellular Biology), who did his master thesis work in the lab, defended his “mémoire” in early April before moving to the group of Pr. Claudio De Virgilio (University of Fribourg, Switzerland) for an internship. During his master thesis work, Nathan studied the role of Gap1 phosphorylation.

Gabriel Rocha is a PhD student working in the group of Sandra Paiva (Braga, Portugal), he recently spent a few weeks in the lab to carry out experiments on proteins playing a key role in endocytosis of the Jen1 lactate permease.

Alyn Alkan is 3rd year student in Molecular Biology and Genetics Department at Izmir Institute of Technology(Turkey). She joined the lab for a summer internship and works in collaboration with Celine Barthelemy on a human amino acid transporter.

We will soon welcome two new pregraduate students, Martin Van Vlasselaer (ULB, master in Biochemistry and Molecular and Cellular Biology, 2nd year) and Stelios Gionis (University of Athens, Greece). The team grows up !