Biography

Yeast comprises a conserved core regulated cell death process that shares several cell death regulators with mammalian cells, which play major roles in the pathogenesis of human diseases. At the same time, it lacks cell death regulators that have evolved in higher eukaryotes, which allows elucidating the basic molecular pathways of regulated cell death without interference from multifaceted regulation that has evolved in higher eukaryotes, thus overcoming the problem of cellular specificity often observed in studies using mammalian systems. It also comprises a simpler system to study the individual functional and mechanistic properties of mammalian apoptotic regulators by heterologously expressing these proteins.

We have been extensively studying apoptotic mechanisms and signalling pathways, namely those involving mitochondria membrane permeabilization and the release of apoptogenic factors in yeast, as well as the crosstalk between the mitochondria and the vacuole. In collaboration with other CBMA colleagues from the mammalian field we have also begun studies with mammalian cell lines and corroborated several of our major findings obtained in the yeast model. More recently, and keeping a straight collaboration with researchers from national /international institutions, we have been extensively using yeast as an “in vivo” system for functional and molecular studies of individual mammalian apoptotic regulators.

Our global aim is to continue elucidating the core cell death regulatory network in living organisms, and ultimately uncover attractive molecular targets for the development of novel therapeutics of Human pathologies associated with cell death dysfunctions.