School of Biomedical Sciences is pleased to invite you to join the following seminar:

Date: 2 March 2023 (Thursday)
Time: 4:00 pm – 5:30 pm
Venue: Lecture Theatre 2, G/F, William M.W. Mong Block, 21 Sassoon Road

Speaker: Professor Peter Sicinski, Professor of Genetics, Harvard Medical School; Department of Cancer Biology, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute
Talk Title: A novel mechanism of G1/S transition revealed by targeted protein degradation in vivo
 

Biography

Peter Sicinski, M.D., Ph.D. is a Professor of Genetics at Harvard Medical School and a Professor in the Department of Cancer Biology, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute.  His laboratory studies the molecular functions of the core cell cycle machinery in normal development and in various disease states, such as cancer, using genetic, genomic, and proteomic approaches.  The overarching goal of his research is to develop new treatments by targeting specific cell cycle proteins.  A native of Poland, Sicinski received his M.D. and Ph.D. degrees from the Warsaw Medical University in Warsaw, Poland, followed by postdoctoral training at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.  He is a Foreign Member of the Polish Academy of Sciences and a Distinguished Fellow of the Collegium of Eminent Scientists of Polish Origin and Ancestry.

Abstract

Entry of mammalian cells into DNA synthesis (S phase) represents a key event in cell division. According to the current cell cycle models, the Cdc7 kinase represents an essential and rate-limiting trigger of DNA replication, acting together with cyclin-dependent kinase Cdk2.  We now show, using chemical genetic systems which allow an acute shutdown of Cdc7 in in vitro cultured cells as well as in vivo in a living mouse, that Cdc7 is dispensable for cell division of many different cell types. We demonstrate that Cdk1-cyclin B, a kinase currently thought to act exclusively during mitosis, is also active during G1/S transition both in cycling cells and in cells exiting quiescence. We show that Cdc7 and Cdk1 play functionally redundant roles during G1/S transition, and at least one of these kinases is needed for S phase entry. These observations revise our fundamental understanding of cell cycle progression by demonstrating that Cdk1 physiologically regulates two distinct transitions during cell division cycle, while Cdc7 plays a redundant function in DNA replication.

ALL ARE WELCOME

Should you have any enquiries, please feel free to contact Miss Angela Wong at 3917 9216.