News

It’s been a bit of a mystery: is a particular family of proteins responsible for cell survival or cell death in the intestinal lining? A new mouse model developed at the Max Delbrück Centre for Molecular Medicine (MDC) provides clear evidence and a potential treatment target for inflammatory bowel disease.

Together with Charité and WIS, the MDC is establishing the German-Israeli Helmholtz International Research School iNAMES – an interdisciplinary training program for PhD students interested in imaging.

A chlamydia infection triggers an inflammatory response at the cellular level. MDC researchers conducted experiments in cell cultures to examine the role that the enzyme GBP1 plays in this response. They have now published their findings in Cell Reports.

The neuroscientist Dr. James Poulet has been appointed to the W3 professorship for Systems Neuroscience at Charité – Universitätsmedizin Berlin in cooperation with the Max Delbrück Center for Molecular Medicine in the Helmholtz Association (MDC). Professor Poulet took up the post on April 1, 2020.

A new diagnostic test to quickly and easily monitor kidney transplant patients for infection and rejection relies on a simple urine sample and a powerful partner: the gene-editing technology CRISPR. Michael Kaminski, who developed it, leads a new Emmy Noether Group at the MDC & Charité.

Thomas Blankenstein receives an ERC Advanced grant for cancer research. The scientist wants to find out if T cells control the development of cancer by a process called immunosurveillance. For this purpose he now proposes a new research model.

In light of the pandemic, the Max Delbrück Center for Molecular Medicine (MDC) is pooling together its resources for projects that advance the understanding of SARS-CoV-2, while scaling down its regular research operations to a minimum. Here’s an overview of the MDC’s current collaborations and plans.

Perceiving warmth requires input from a surprising source: cool receptors. The finding published in Neuron by neuroscientists at the MDC challenges the theory that dedicated neurons convey either warm or cool sensations to the brain.

A protein in the cell envelope influences the rate of fatty acid uptake in cells. This is reported by MDC researchers in the journal PNAS. This process also appears to be altered in overweight people.

Muscle pain and cramps are common side effects of statins. As an MDC and Charité research group now reports in Scientific Reports, the cholesterol reducers actually influence thousands of genes in muscle cells – thereby hindering cell growth and division.