Bernie Ramsahoye
Bristol Medical School (1983-1988)
Member of the Royal College of Physicians (MRCP, 1991)
Member of the Royal College of Pathologists (MRCPath, 1998)
MRC Clinical Training Fellow (1994-1997)
PhD 1999
MRC Clinician Scientist Fellow (2000-2004)
Senior Lecturer and Hon Consultant Haematologist (2004-)
Dr Ramsahoye worked as a junior hospital doctor in Bristol before moving to Cardiff to train as a Haematologist. Whilst in Cardiff he became interested in DNA methylation as a potential cause of cancer and studied for a PhD in DNA methylation. He moved to Edinburgh in 2000 to take up an MRC fellowship and has been employed by the University since 2004.
Dr Ramsahoye is interested in epigenetic mechanisms of gene control. This involves studying DNA methylation and histone modifications, both of which are known to affect the activity sates of genes. He is currently investigating abnormalities of DNA methylation in breast cancer, his ultimate goal being to determine whether breast cancer is ever caused by deregulated DNA methylation. Dr Ramsahoye is also investigating whether the deregulation of epigenetic control mechanisms in breast cancer affects prognosis and response to therapy.
Nick Gilbert
Nick Gilbert graduated from Edinburgh University and studied for a PhD in the department of biochemistry at Edinburgh University. For his PhD he investigated several aspects of higher-order chromatin structure in mammalian cells, supervised by Dr James Allan. He further developed approaches for studying higher-order chromatin folding which he then used to demonstrate that heterochromatin had a more compact structure than bulk chromatin. His subsequent postdoctoral research with Professor Wendy Bickmore at the MRC Human Genetics Unit focused on investigating genome-wide chromatin structure where in collaboration with the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute he generated the first chromatin structure map of the human genome. In addition he studied the role chromatin-modifying proteins and histone modifications play in modulating chromatin fibre structure.
Dr Gilbert started his lab in 2006 at the Edinburgh Cancer Research Centre with a fellowship from the Wellcome Trust. His lab is interested in identifying novel factors that can influence chromatin fibre folding and have identified a number of chromatin-associated RNAs that might play a role in regulating chromatin structure. They are also investigating the chromatin structure of the active and inactive X chromosomes to help characterise the role of epigenetic modifications in influencing chromatin fibre structure. They have recently started a collaborative program between colleagues in the MRC Human Genetics Unit and the Edinburgh Cancer Research Centre funded by Breakthrough Breast cancer. This program will build on their fundamental studies of chromatin structure to investigate the role of epigenetic pathways in breast cancer initiation and progression.
Dr Richard Meehan
Richard Meehan graduated from Trinity College Dublin, Ireland, with a BA degree in Genetics, and obtained his PhD at the MRC Human Genetics Unit, Scotland on the Molecular Genetic Analysis of Hepatic Cytochrome P-450s in mammals (supervised by Dr.’s ND Hastie & CR Wolf). Subsequent postdoctoral research with Dr. Adrian Bird at the IMP, Vienna focused on the characterisation of methyl-CpG binding (MeCP) activities in mammals. This was followed by I.C.R.F. Research Fellowship (with Adrian Bird) at the University of Edinburgh, on the identification of additional MeCP components.
Since starting his lab in 1995 at the Biochemistry Department, George Square, Edinburgh, he has developed Xenopus laevis as a model organism to determine the role of DNA methyltransferases (Dnmts) and MeCPs in development. They made the seminal observation that DxDnmt1 is required to maintain transcriptional silencing in pre-mid-blastula transition (MBT) embryos. Dr Meehan was also part of a successful collaboration with Lorraine Young and Sir Ian Wilmut, which examined the dynamics of DNA methylation patterns in early in normal and cloned sheep embryos. In contrast to mice and humans, they did not observe preferential asymmetric paternal demethylation in ovine zygotes. While at George Square he benefited from a classical education in chromatin structure analysis by Jim Allan and Sari Pennings. Richard joined the MRC Human Genetics Unit, Edinburgh in 2003, where his lab focuses on molecular mechanisms by which the maintenance cytosine DNA methyltransferase, Dnmt1 and MeCPs mediate gene silencing in early embryos and somatic cells. Recently they identified a non-catalytic transcriptional repressor role for xDnmt1 in early frog development that contributes to gene silencing in pre-MBT embryos. They have just initiated a joint program (headed by Mike Dixon and David Harrison) with colleagues in the HGU and Edinburgh Cancer Research Centre that is funded by Breakthrough Breast cancer that will investigate the role of epigenetic pathways in breast cancer initiation and progression.
