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October 2023

Time to say good-bye!Many good but also sad events happened in October. We congratulate Sonja Sahner from the AG Hake on an incredible 30 years of service! What would we all do without you, Sonja? You are the best! Congratulations!

Unfortunately we had to say several goodbyes in October. On the one hand, it was with a heavy heart that we had to say goodbye to Melanie Bingel, who will return to her original laboratory after a year-long implementation. Thank you for your tireless help, Melanie. We will miss you and wish you all the best in your new/old job!

On the other hand, Prof. Sigurd Braun's group is leaving Heinrich-Buff-Ring 58. As part of the upcoming renovation, the AG Braun has moved into the laboratories of the Institute of Biochemistry. But: out of sight does not mean out of mind! We will continue to work closely together as an Institute and will not allow ourselves to be segregated by spatial separation. The ties of the Institute for Genetics' scientific family (members of the Braun, Dammann and Hake groups) remain strong!

 

September/October 2023

Welcome back, Nadine!Everyone in the 'Hake team' is overjoyed that Nadine is back in the laboratory after the birth of her child. Congratulations, Nadine! We will do everything we can to help you combine both motherhood and being a scientist without too much stress! Welcome back!

 

September 2023

Visit from Agnes Kavira!

We are honored and overjoyed by the visit of Agnes Kavira, an extraordinary young woman who fought her way through very difficult conditions! Agnes was born in the Republic of Congo and through hard work and dedication managed to secure a “BEBUC” scholarship to study medicine. She is currently working and studying in Paris and Alexandria (Egypt) and stopped by for a day visit. It's wonderful to finally meet Agnes in person and hear directly about her remarkable career path, which is just beginning and which we all support.
Agnes, you are an impressive role model for so many young people and are now part of the Hake team!

 

September 2023

Hake group retreat to Limburg

This year the Hake team went to Limburg. A beautiful city whose history we were all able to explore in more detail with a guided tour of the city. A competition to see who could leave first one of two identical "Escape Rooms" combined teamwork, fun, adventure and adrenaline rushes.... With a good meal this very successful and hot day came to an end.

 

September 2023

Welcome Felix!

The 'Hake team' is pleased that Felix Diegmüller is starting as a new doctoral student. Felix has already successfully completed his Bachelor's and Master's theses in the Hake team and will now continue his excellent work. We are sure that he will also shine in his doctoral thesis! Good luck, Felix! We are extremely happy that you stayed with us!

 

July 2023

A "day to do good" at the Institute of Genetics

The motto of this year's institute excursion was "doing something good". First, we did something good for nature by collecting rubbish at the river Lahn. Unfortunately, this was urgently necessary. After a picnic lunch on the banks of the Lahn, we continued to the climbing forest. There, we did something good physically and mentally for ourselves. After this top sporting performance, there was extensive feasting, drinking and celebrating. A beautiful day that brought us closer together!

 

July 2023

School student internship Number 3

And even more students have visited the Institute of Genetics for an internship. We are very excited about the interest of the next generation in natural sciences, especially biology and epigenetics. Maybe we have a future top researcher "in the making" here!

 

May 2023

Congratulations, Andreas Herchenröther, on the excellent doctoral examination

A new doctor is in the Hake group! Congratulations to Andreas Herchenröther for an excellent thesis defense. He stunned the thesis defense examiners Sandra Hake, Alexander Brehm, Katja Sträßer and Marek Bartkuhn with a brilliant talk and on-point answers to all questions. Fantastic job, Dr. Herchenröther!

Soon, Andreas will be leaving Germany to rock the USA as PostDoc! We all will miss him and wish him an exciting time with many great discoveries!

 

March 2023

School student internship Number 2

We are excited about the new generation of students and – hopefully – future researchers to be! During another two-week student internship at the Institute for Genetics, the current participant even managed to make a new discovery that will advance our research projects! Congratulations! We are very happy about her active help and hope that she will decide to study biology at the JLU after her Abitur. The Institute is waiting impatiently!

 

March 2023

"Paper-hanging" party of Andreas Herchenröther's Nature Communications publication

Finally, Andreas Herchenröther's work from the team of Prof. Dr. Hake on the chromatin protein HMG20A and its role in controlling important gene expression programs in early embryonic development and stem cell differentiation was published in Nature Communications. These groundbreaking discoveries were also highlighted by the JLU press department (https://tinyurl.com/2p8ct4mx) and are also to be selected by the Cardio Pulmonary Institute (CPI; https ://www.cpi-online.de/) as "Paper of the Month".

As is tradition at the Institute of Genetics, the paper was ceremonially hung on the publication wall. Everyone involved and who were on site (Andreas Herchenröther, Felix Diegmüller, Jie Lan, Marek Bartkuhn and Stefanie Gossen (Marburg University)) helped.

 

March 2023 

Congratulations PROF. Dr. Sigurd Braun!The Institute of Genetics warmly welcomes Sigurd Braun as a new W2 professor and congratulates him on his appointment to the JLU! Sigurd enriches our chromatin and epigenetics research focus with his excellent and internationally recognized work on the mechanisms of heterochromatin establishment and maintenance. To this end, he introduced a new model system at the institute, the fission yeast S. pombe. This allows conducting large-scale, state-of-the-art screens with genetically modified organisms.Sigurd and his international team of Ph.D. students (Agnisrota, Abubakar, Karl und Vishnu) came from the LMU Munich to the JLU in 2021 via the renowned Heisenberg program funded by the DFG. We are delighted that he and his group are immensely strengthening our team and our research and teaching. Of course, this special moment had to be celebrated with all institute members.

 

 

 

 

 

January 2023

School student internship

Everyone at the Institute of Genetics welcome three school students for their two-week internship here on site. Sterile work, cell extractions, gel electrophoresis, western blots, cloning and much more are learned. So much interest and enthusiasm is contagious. We look forward to the next generation of University students at the JLU!

 

 

January 2023

Study from Andreas Herchenroether accepted by Nature Communications

Congratulations Andreas!

Andreas seminal work on HMG20A's chromatin function during early embryonic development and stem cell differentiation was accepted in the journal Nature Communications. This happy occasion was celebrated with everyone involved on site, Jie Lan, Jörg Leers and Felix Diegmüller (Hake Group), our collaboration partners Marek Bartkuhn and Tobias Friedrich (Bartkuhn Group) and the entire Hake team!

Excellent work Andreas!

The study was so sensational that a German television team conducted interviews with all those involved during a subsequent celebration in a Giessen club.

As soon as the publication is published, Andreas' discoveries and the contributed work of our collaborators will be reported here in detail.


December 2022

Christmas-Party at the Institute for Genetics

After a long - and at times lonely - pandemic period, all employees of the Institute of Genetics finally came together for a Christmas party. We spent a wonderful evening together with games, secret Santa gift, lots of laughter and a concluding dinner in a restaurant in the city.

 

December 2022

Welcome, Franzi!

The 'Hake team' welcomes Franziska Hintermeier as a new doctoral student. Franzi will work on the biological function and chromatin incorporation of a newly discovered histone variant in collaboration with the team of Prof. Kaustuv Sanyal (Jawaharlal Nehru Center for Advanced Scientific Research, India).

We wish Franzi a successful and happy time at the institute!

 

November 2022

Welcome Melanie Bingel and Dennis Koch: new technician in the Hake group and secretary at the Institute for Genetics

All members of the Institute for Genetics are thrilled to welcome Dennis Koch as new secretary of the Institute as well as Melanie Bingel as new Technician in the Hake group! Welcome, Dennis and Melanie! We are super happy to have you as new team members and are looking forward to a great teamwork!

 

October 2022

Retreat of the Institute for Genetics to Frankfurt

Finally, members of the Institute for Genetics (Braun, Dammann & Hake teams) did participate in a long-awaited retreat together. This year we traveled to Frankfurt and visited the beautiful palm garden (Pamengarten), had delicious Burgers for lunch and ended the visit high up in the sky on the Main-Tower. The sun was shining and we enjoyed every minute of the day together!

 

September 2022

6th SFB/TRR81 Symposium

The last international SFB/TRR81 Symposium “Chromatin Changes in Differentiation and Malignancies” took place in Egmond aan Zee, The Netherlands. The PhD students Lena Paasche, Andreas Herchenröther and Tim-Marius Wunderlich from the Hake team successfully presented their work on interaction partners of the histone variant H2A.Z on posters and in talks (Lena & Sandra). We all learned a lot, found new collaboration partners, discussed many things, had lots of fun and will miss our meetings, when the SFB/TRR81 finishes end of 2022.

 

September 2022

Good-bye Lena!

After four years at the Institute for Genetics in the Hake group, our technical assistant Lena Vogel, who always helped us with lab organisation duties, is leaving us! Thank you for your help, Lena! Lena starts a completely new stage in her life outside of Giessen. We wish Lena all the best for her new tasks and challenges.

 

September 2022

SFB/TRR81 Seminar of Prof. Dr. David Tremethick

Fantastic lecture on H2A.Z and H2A.B in genome organization and transcription regulation by David Tremethick - one of THE key leaders in the field of histone variants. Thank you, David, for visiting us here in Giessen  as invited speaker from the SFB/TRR81 consortium.

 

August 2022

Summer-BBQ of the Institute for Genetics

We had to wait a long time, but finally it happened: we again had a summer BBQ with all members of the Institute for Genetics. What do you want more: sunshine, temperatures above 300C, lots of delicious food as well as lots of laughter and fun!

 

July 2022

Review “H2A.Z’s social network: functional partners of an enigmatic histone variant” from Carlotta Kreienbaum and Lena Paasche published

Beautiful and insightful review by Carlotta Kreienbaum and Lena Paasche, PhD students in the Hake group, about interacting proteins of the histone variant H2A.Z has been published in Trends Biochem Sci. Great read for everyone interested in histone variants and beyond!

See also:

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0968000422001141?via%3Dihub

 

July 2022

SFB/TRR81 Seminar of Dr. Marcus Buschbeck

Dr. Marcus Buschbeck from the ‘Josep Carreras Leukaemia Research Institute’ in Badalona, Spain, has given a ‘Hybrid-Talk’ in the framework of the SFB/TRR81 Seminar at Institute for Genetics. Everyone in the audience was thrilled by his newest insights about histone variants and epigenetic mechanisms in leukaemias. Marcus spent his day in Giessen talking to members of the Institute, where many ideas were discussed and possible collaborations started (also over a ‘Pizza-Lunch’).

 

June 2022

„Team-Building Activities“ of the Braun & Hake groups

After more than two enduring years of the Corona pandemic, it was finally possible again: We all could get together! With so many new members at the Institute, we decided to have a “Team-Building” Day to strengthen the team spirit. With lots of fun, ideas and creativity, many challenges were collectively solved:

“Egg Roll”: how to fastest move one egg from one floor to the next without touching and cracking it (see movie)?

“Newspaper Tower”: how to build the highest but still stable newspaper tower?

“Research Term Presentation”: how to present a research term without talking (see “Mitosis Dance” video)?  

And, of course, many, many other challenges (see picture). This successful day was completed with a joint dinner and lots of laughter at the river ‘Lahn’.

Egg-Roll-Video: Mitosis-Video:

 

May 2022

Good-bye Julia and Welcome Joline!

Everyone at the Institute for Genetics is sad that our secretary Julie Paul (right) is leaving us. We thank her for her commitment, her help, great spirit and happiness. We will miss her and wish her all the best for her new job!

Yet, there are also good news to celebrate: Joline Bergel (left) is Julia’s successor. We are very excited and are looking forward to our cooperation with Joline and are sure that we are going to become a great team. Welcome to the Institute, Joline!

 

April 2022

Review “Spotlight on histone H2A variants: From B to X to Z” from Andreas Herchenröther, Tim Wunderlich and Jie Lan published

Highly informative review about the recent discoveries on the function of histone H2A variants H2A.B, H2A.X and H2A.Z has been published in Semin Cell Dev Biol. Andreas Herchenröther, Tim Marius Wunderlich and Jie Lan, members of the Hake group, have put together this great work! A must read for all chromatin and H2A variant fans.

See also:

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S1084952122000970?via%3Dihub

 

December 2021

Farewell Anna & Christmas-Party

It is the end of an era: Anna Hergott, who reliably and vigorously supported us and our predecessors over many years, is now retiring. We thank you, Anna, for your tireless commitment for the Institute for Genetics and wish you a wonderful and calmer time.

Additionally, we got together for our X-Mas party. Even though we had to celebrate in the cold, with masks and under Corona-rules (all vaccinated and tested), we had lots of fun and joy. Finally, a collective adventure that united us with games and music and generated a fantastic atmosphere. Many thanks to the main organizers Carlotta and Lena!

 

November 2021

Welcome Julia Paul: our new secretary at the Institute for Genetics

All members of the Institute for Genetics are thrilled to welcome Julia Paul as new secretary! She is going to be trained by our current secretary Anna Hergott, who will, unfortunately, retire and leave us in Mid-December. Welcome, Julia! We are looking forward to a great teamwork!

Corona-related start in freezy outdoors.

 

October 2021

Congratulations Tara to a successful Thesis Defense!

Tara Procida, from the Hake group, did successfully defend her Thesis at the JLU Giessen. She is the first PhD student from the Hake team that graduated at the JLU. After her defense, Tara was celebrated from the whole Genetic Institute and many friends. We are all extremely proud of you, Tara!

 

September 2021

Welcome Lena!

The Hake group welcomes Lena Weber cordially as new PhD student. Lena, we appreciate it very much that you decided to conduct your doctoral thesis with us. We are super excited: we already know that you are a valuable part of your team and wish you a successful and happy time in the lab.

Lena Weber

 

April - May 2021

Welcome Carlotta & Jie!

A shared path ends, others are starting. We are saying farewell to Sandy (Sandra Stullgys), who we will miss very much! All the best for your new career! But there are also great news: Carlotta Kreienbaum, who successfully prepared her Master Thesis within the Hake group and thrilled us with her singing talent, startet her PhD thesis; and Jie Lan, a highly experienced chromatin researcher, began his PostDoc work in the Hake group. We are welcoming both of them and are looking forward to exciting discoveries. Best of luck!

 

February 2021

ZAP-70, involved in B cell receptor signalling, regulates gene expression, cellular fitness and protein synthesis in chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) cells

The Hake group is happy to have contributed to the story headed by Ingo Ringshausen, University of Cambridge, UK, demonstrating how constitutive levels of ZAP-70 increase the aggressiveness of CLL. This study showed that ZAP-70 promotes cell survival and protein synthesis, thereby improving cellular fitness of CLL cells and driving disease progression. The study is now published in Blood.

See also:

https://ashpublications.org/blood/article-abstract/doi/10.1182/blood.2020009960/475287/ZAP-70-constitutively-regulates-gene-expression?redirectedFrom=fulltext

 

January 2021

Farewell of Konstantin Kletenkov

Konstantin Kletenkov, PostDoc in the Hake group, found a new position and leaves the team end of January. We will miss a great colleague and very good friend and congratulate him to this fantastic next step in his career. With his knowledge and constant team support he was always a great help and estimated member of the Hake team. With a little “Corona-conform” celebration we gave him a hearty farewell and wish him all the best for his future.

 

 

JAZF1 is a novel p400-complex member involved in H2A.Z acetylation at regulatory regions (enhancers)

Great work from TARA PROCIDA, a PhD student in the Hake group, was just published in IJMS. In collaboration with the groups of Marek Bartkuhn, Thorsten Stiewe, Tilman Borggrefe and Matthias Mann and help from former (Jack, Peritore & Bönisch) and current (Daus & Kletenkov) Hake group members, Tara identified JAZF1 as novel member of the H2A.Z-specific p400/TIP60/NuA4 chaperone complex and demonstrated its role in the regulation of H2A.Z acetylation levels at more than 1.000 regulatory regions (enhancers) and its involvement in ribosome biogenesis.

See also:

https://www.mdpi.com/1422-0067/22/2/678

 

 

Chromatin remodelling processes during urinary tract infections identified

The Hake group is happy to have contributed to the story headed by the JLU researchers Sudhanshu Bushan and Andreas Meinhardt demonstrating decreased acetyl-CoA levels upon uropathic E. coli infections leading to reduced H3K9 acetylation at promoters and changes in gene expression pattern. Hence, upon infection, the bacteria rearrange host cell metabolism to induce chromatin remodeling processes that subvert expression of host innate immune response genes. The study is now published in J. Infect.Dis.

See also:

https://academic.oup.com/jid/advance-article-abstract/doi/10.1093/infdis/jiab018/6102582?redirectedFrom=fulltext

 

 

December 2020

Virtual Christmas-Party

Everything was different this year. SARS-CoV-2 had not respect for our desire to celebrate, and so the Hake lab got together with Marek’s new team and organized a virtual Christmas party. Many thanks to the “newcomers”, who were responsible for planning and preparation of this unusual event. Due to their effort, in the end we all had a wonderful party with gifts, games and lots of fun. Even with distance, what a fantastic team! Merry X-mas, happy New Year 2021 and, most of all, stay safe and healthy!

 

 

 

Architecture of the NuRD complex solved

Congratulations to Sandra Hake, who contributed to the latest discoveries on the architecture of the nucleosome remodeling and deacetylase (NuRD) complex by the Joel Mackay group (Sydney, Australia). They define the stoichiometry of the complex and demonstrate that PWWP2A competes with MBD3 to sequester the Deacetylase module from NuRD. The study is now published in Cell Reports.

See also:

https://www.cell.com/cell-reports/pdf/S2211-1247(20)31439-X.pdf

 


Graphical abstract of Low et al, Cell Reports, 2020

 

 

November 2020

Decoration-Competition“ between the Hake Labs

To have some fun and joy in these dull and contact-less days, a decoration competition between the Hake labs was organized. The challenge was to decorate the labs according to the theme “Fall-Winter-Halloween”. An independent and competent jury consisting of the former lab members Marek and David determined the winners: Lab 306 with Nadine, Sandy and Tara. Congratulations! It was a tight result; everyone was extremely creative and imaginative and all participants had lots of fun. Such an event will certainly be repeated in the next year… And, of course, everything was executed strictly according to Corona guidelines.

 

July 2020

Nature publication on the role of H3.3 Serine 31 phosphorylation in transcription induction

In collaboration with the groups of Steven Z. Josefowicz, Haitao Li and C. David Allis did members of the Hake team help to discover new functions of the histone variant H3.3. Phosphorylation of the H3.3-unique serine at position 31 (H3.3S31ph), which was first identified by Sandra Hake to be mitosis-specific (Hake SB et al., PNAS, 2005), leads to a stimulus-dependent rapid induction of transcription due to recruitment and ejection of chromatin regulators in post-mitotic cells. Details can be found in the original article published in Nature:

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-020-2533-0

 

 

April 2020

Congratulations to Prof. Dr. Marek Bartkuhn

An era is ending: Marek Bartkuhn, long-standing research assistant, bioinformatics-guru, chromatin-specialist, “smart cookie” and fantastic friend accepted the W2 professorship for Bioinformatics and Systems Biology at the FB11 (Medicine) of the JLU and is leaving the Institute for Genetics. We are all extremely happy about Marek’s success and are, at the same time, very sad to lose him as direct colleague. All the best, Marek! We will miss you!

                                        Prof. Dr. Marek Bartkuhn

 

Due to the Corona-Pandemie, we had to give a virtual fare-well to Marek.

 

March 2020

Corona Pandemic

End of March, we had to drastically reduce our experimental work due to the ongoing Corona Pandemic. Empty floors, deserted labs and virtual meetings are evidences of this difficult time. But clearly, health comes first! We all hope that everyone at the Institute and their family and friends will get through the crisis unharmed.

 

 

 

December 2019

Christmas Party of the Institute for Genetics

With lots of fun, gifts, entertaining games and good food the members of the Institute for Genetics celebrated an advanced Christmas party. All PIs had to give ad hoc presentations to imaginative scientific discoveries. “Dirty-Santa” gifts and many games enriched the amazing atmosphere even more and a delicious meal at a restaurant with a memorable poem by Tim completed the event exquisitely.

 

 

November 2019

Histone variants H3.X and H3.Y and their functional role in DUX4 expression

Congratulations to Sandra Hake who contributed to the latest discoveries in H3.X and H3.Y histone variant biology made by the Stephen Tapscott group (Seattle, USA). The authors discovered a feedback loop between the transcription factor DUX4, involved in facioscapulohumeral dystrophy (FSHD), and the primate-specific histone variants H3.Y and H3.X, identified in 2010 by the Hake group. Their findings provide a model for how the brief expression of DUX4 can establish via H3.X/Y a memory of its transcriptional network. The study is now published in Cell Reports.

See also:

https://www.cell.com/cell-reports/fulltext/S2211-1247(19)31325-7

 

Graphical abstract of Resnick R. et al., Cell Reports, 2019

 

 

October 2019

Team-Forming Activities of the Hake group

This year’s Hake lab retreat took place at the Institute to strengthen the team spirit with many different challenges. With lots of fun, creativity, trust and cleverness all members of the group solved several different problems, such as:

“Egg-Drop”: how to wrap/secure a raw egg with some selected lab consumables to prevent breakage after falling from the third story of the building?

“Towel-Turn”: how to turn a towel while the whole team stands on it?

„Spaghetti-Marshmallow-Tower“: how to build the highest but still stable spaghetti tower with a marshmallow on top, when only tape, rubber band and rope are allowed to be used?

“Minefield”: how to travers through an area with many obstacles while having the eyes tied and only the partner is allowed to shout directions from a distance?  

 

And besides many other challenges, four teams had to generate a logo that best represents the Hake team and its scientific focus. It was a fantastic day with lots of fun, laughter and new insights, where everyone got closer with each other.

 

September 2019

5th International Symposium of the TRR81

The 5th international Symposium of the TRR81, organized by U. Bauer, A. Brehm, T. Borggrefe, F. Grosveld, S. Hake, M. Kracht, S. Philipsen and X. Yuan, took place at the MPI in Bad Nauheim from September 9th till 11th. Fantastic talks and amazing poster presentations featured new discoveries that are in the scientific focus of the TRR81 “Chromatin changes in differentiation and malignancies”. We are extremely happy and proud that Sandra Stullgys and Tim Wunderlich from the Hake team won the 3rd price for their poster presentation and flash talk.

 

July 2019

Congratulations to Stephanie Link for her fantastic PhD Defense!

Stephanie Link, who is a member of the Hake group and continued working at the LMU Munich, has successfully defended her PhD Thesis.

 

Marek Bartkuhn: Two Papers Published

Congratulations to Marek Bartkuhn from the Hake team and Tobias Zimmermann, whose bioinformatic analyses contributed to TWO collaborative papers published now in Cancers & Nature Communications.

See also:

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/31242600

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/31249304

Paper-Party and “Paper-Hanging” tradition to celebrate Marek’s and Tobias’s recent achievements.

 

 

Summer-BBQ Party of the Institute of Genetics

Although the summer made a short break and temperatures dropped, we all had a fantastic time at this year’s Summer-BBQ-Party and table tennis game, with almost all members of the Institute participating. The tables almost collapsed under the weight of the self-made and delicious food. In addition, several past birthdays were celebrated with lots of presents. It was, as always, a wonderful and happy day, we will remember for a long time.

 

 

June 2019

Welcome to our new Bachelor Students

We are happy to welcome our new Bachelor Students at the Institute of Genetics!!! Valentina Birne, Niklas Papenkordt, Max Pommert, Inga Stellmacher and Lena Weber are joining the Hake team, and Annika Dohmen, Yannic Noe and Nico Schlaudraff are working in the group of Reinhard Dammann. We are sure, we will all have a great and productive time together!

 

Review on H2A.Z’s role in Gene Regulation

Congratulations to Andreas Herchenröther from the Hake team, who contributed to a review from the Tilman Borggrefe group on “H2A.Z in Gene Regulation”, published now in Epigenetics & Chromatin. See also:

https://epigeneticsandchromatin.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s13072-019-0274-9

Andreas starting the new tradition of displaying papers from the Hake team published at the JLU Giessen

 

25 years of employment, congratulations to Jörg Leers!

This June, Jörg Leers’ 25th year job anniversary took place. Congratulations to his long and exciting scientific career! We are happy and lucky to have such a fantastic, funny and experienced colleague in our team!

Jörg Leers

 

May 2019

Welcome Tim!

The Hake lab welcomes Tim Marius Wunderlich as new PhD student! We are thrilled that Tim is joining us and continues the highly successful work of Stephanie Link, who will graduate in Munich soon. Good luck for your studies, Tim!

Tim Wunderlich (in the middle)

 

May 2019

Institute for Genetics "takes off"!

This year’s Institute retreat took us to Darmstadt. We had a fantastic, “high-orbiting” time at the ESA (ESOC). Cosmology meets Biology: we all can learn a lot from each other. The day was concluded at the zoo with more exciting discoveries in the reptile, butterflies, bird and ape houses made.

 

April 2019

Sonja Sahner officially honored!

Although her 25th year job anniversary happened already last year, the president of the JLU Giessen, Prof. Dr. Mukherjee, presented Sonja with her certificate at an official ceremony. Music, sparkling wine, speeches and great food made it an amazing day to remember. (see also https://www.uni-giessen.de/ueber-uns/pressestelle/pm/pm65-19)

 

 

 

March 2019

Girls-Day Rocks!

Today, 5th grade school girls visited our lab and successfully performed many experiments under the guidance of Marek Bartkuhn. We had lots of fun and were quite impressed by these motivated future scientists. Look at what they did with red cabbage juice: a big color spectacle in early spring time!

 

February 2019

Welcome Konstantin, a new PostDoc in the Hake group!

We are thrilled to welcome Konstantin Kletenkov, the new PostDoc in the Hake group!

 

December 2018

Christmas Party  

The groups of Reinhard Dammann and Sandra Hake have jointly celebrated Christmas with many games, gifts, fun, laughter and delicious food. It was an unforgettable party; 1000 thanks to all participants! Together, we are recapitulating a successful year 2018 and are looking forward to mastering all challenges in 2019!

 

Job-Anniversary of Sonja Sahner

Sonja Sahner, the lab manager of the group of Sandra Hake, celebrated 25th job anniversary. We all thank Sonja for her tireless commitment, her organization talent, her dedication of the team, and that she cheers us up with her optimism and laughter. We are looking forward to many, many more years with Sonja at our side!

Reinhard Dammann pays tribute to Sonja at an internal celebration party.

 

October 2018

Welcome Sandra, Lena and Tobias

The Hake team welcomes three new members in Fall 2018. Sandra Stullgys complements the group as new PhD student, Lena Vogel strengthens the technical assistants’ staff and Tobias Friedrich performs practical work and will prepare his Master Thesis. We are all extremely happy about the reinforcement of our team!

From left to right: Lena Vogel, Tobias Friedrich and Sandra Stullgys

 

The story on PWWP2A-H2A.Z continues…

Together with research groups from Marburg, Munich, Cambridge (UK) and Sydney (Australia), members of the Hake group in collaboration with Marek Bartkuhn investigated in detail the chromatin binding abilities of PWWP2A and its role in gene regulation. This work, headed by Stephanie Link and Ramona Spitzer, opens new insights into the intricate mechanisms of how H2A.Z, via recruitment of PWWP2A and a histone deacetylase complex, influences histone modifications at regulatory genomic elements leading to the modulation of target gene transcription. Details are found within the original article published in Nature Communication:

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-018-06665-5

 

September 2018

Congratulations to Ramona Spitzer to her successful PhD Defense

Ramona Spitzer, who is a member of the Hake group and continued working at the LMU Munich, has successfully defended her PhD Thesis.

Ramona after her successful and fantastic PhD defence.

 

August 2018

Institute Retreat: Sportive challenges

This year, all members of the Genetic Institute participated together in a sportive retreat. Tree climbing in the morning and table tennis as well as tabel football in the afternoon guaranteed a day of fun.

Members of the Hake and Dammann teams at the "Klettergarten"

 

The winners of the table tennis tournament

 

August 2018

Welcome Rashed

We all welcome Mohammad Rashedul Alam as a new member of the Hake team!

Rashed celebrated the start of his PhD with delicious, self-cooked Bangladeshi food.

Rashed (on the left) together with members of the Hake and Dammann teams and his wife celebrating the start of his PhD work in the seminar room with exquisite Bangladeshi food.

 

July 2018

Inaugural Lecture of Sandra Hake

On July 5th 2018, the President of the JLU Giessen and the Dean of the Faculty 08 invited the public to the Inaugural Lecture “Beyond the DNA double helix: Why the same genes do not implicate same fate” of Sandra Hake.

 

Job-Anniversary of Anna Hergott

Anna Hergott, secretary and soul of the Institute of Genetics, celebrates her 25th job anniversary. All members of the Institute thank Anna for her continous commitment and help, the organisation of the Institute would not be possible without her. Thank you and congratulations, Anna!

Anna Hergott

 

DFG-funding of Collaborative Chromatin Research in Gießen/Marburg/Bad Nauheim and Rotterdam (TRR81) continues for four years!

The German Research Foundation (DFG) provides funding for the third and last funding period of the Collaborative Research Center, the TransRegio TRR81 “Chromatin Changes in Differentiation and Malignancies” between Gießen/Marburg/Bad Nauheim and Rotterdam. The TRR81 coordinates research of 22 groups, an integrated research training network and two special core facilities homed in the faculties of the Justus-Liebig-University Gießen, Philipps-University Marburg, Max-Planck-Institute Bad Nauheim, and Erasmus University Rotterdam, The Netherlands, as well as two external Universities (Cologne and Heidelberg/Mannheim). Spokesperson and coordinator of the TRR81 is Prof. Alexander Brehm (Marburg), Vice-coordinator is Prof. Sandra Hake (Gießen) and Coordinator in Rotterdam is Prof. Sjaak Philipsen.

The TRR81 focuses on chromatin structure changes occurring during cell differentiation and malignancies. For more information see https://www.uni-giessen.de/fbz/fb08/trr81

 

June 2018

Summer-BBQ of the Institute of Genetics

With best weather, all members of the Institute of Genetics got together for the yearly BBQ on the JLU Campus. Sunshine, hot sausages, salads, BBQ-sauces and delicious desserts warranted a stimulating and cheerful atmosphere!

Masters of BBQ

 

Collective meal of both scientific groups

 

End of an Era

On June 30th, 2018, after almost 50!!! years of service for the Institute of Genetics at the JLU, Leni (Helen) Schäfer-Pfeiffer has laid aside her pipette and started her well-deserved retirement.

We wish her all the best for the new path-of-life and thank her for her outstanding commitment over the last decades!

Leni together with her husband at the farewell party

 

April 2018

Tara Procida is awarded with JLU Graduate Stipend!

Congratulations to Tara Procida, who was awarded with the prestigious Graduate Stipend from the JLU!

Tara Procida

 

January 2018

Sandra Hake was elected member of the advisory board of the German Genetics Society (Gesellschaft für Genetik, GfG)

https://www.gfgenetik.de and  http://www.biospektrum.de/blatt/d_bs_pdf&_id=1539845

 

 

 

 

 

October 2017

Gone with the win…

Stormy fall weather sets the Genetic Institute into motion…

 

Retreat of the Genetics Institute to Friedberg

This year, all members of Reinhard Damman’s and Sandra Hake’s groups traveled to Friedberg. After sightseeing of the old city and castle and lunch, we demonstrated our sportiveness by playing “black-light” minigolf.

 

 

Welcome Tara and Andreas!

Tara Procida and Andreas Herchenröther are new PhD students in the group of Sandra Hake. We are all excited about Tara’s and Andreas’ start in our team!

              

 Tara Procida                 and       Andreas Herchenröther

 

Congratulations to Lisa-Maria Zink’s excellent thesis defense!

Lisa-Maria Zink, from the group of Sandra Hake, did an amazing job in her thesis defense.

  

Lisa-Maria Zink (left) celebrating her excellent thesis defense at the LMU Munich.

 

September 2017

PWWP2A and Mitosis

Stephanie Link and Sandra Hake have written a feature article on PWWP2A’s role in mitotic processes. The review that was published in the Journal “Cell Cycle” can be viewed under http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/15384101.2017.1372523.

 

 

 

September 2017

3rd International EMBO Workshop on Histone Variants

Sandra Hake, together with her co-organizers Marcus Buschbeck and Patrick Heun and with administrative support of Anna Hergott and Carolin Brieger, did organize the 3rd international EMBO Workshop “Histone Variants: Molecular functions in health and disease”, September 6th – 8th, 2017 in Planegg-Martinsried (http://meetings.embo.org/event/17-histone-variants). With participants from all over the world (e.g. Australia, Japan, Korea, Europe), excellent talks and posters and many stimulating discussion sessions, the meeting turned out to be a great success.

Marcus Buschbeck, Sandra Hake und Patrick Heun

 

Sandra Hake as moderator and chair of the final panel discussion session.

 

June 2017

PWWP2A: a new partner of H2A.Z nucleosomes

An international science team headed by Sandra Hake identified PWWP2A, a so-far

uncharacterized protein, as interactor of the histone variant H2A.Z. PWWP2A

binds to chromatin in a multivalent manner and has important functions in gene

regulation, mitosis and cranial-facial development in frogs. Details can be found

in the original publication in The EMBO Journal

(http://emboj.embopress.org/content/early/2017/06/23/embj.201695757.long).

 

 

 

At the time M.Sc. Tara Procida is on training in our institute

   

Tara Procida                     coached by Leni......

 

 

March 2017

Masters of the Table

Getting together: the AG Dammann and AG Hake celebrated the start of their newly installed

yearly sportive tournament (at the table tennis plate). The picture shows all participants and

the winner, our "Genetics Timo Boll" Jörg Leers (right)!

(Only Adriana, Nadine, Sonja and Tobias are missing.)

 

February 2017

Deposition requirements of H3.Y and H3.3 revealed

The graduate student Lisa-Maria Zink (AG Hake, LMU Team) in close collaboration with the

groups of Matthias Mann (MPI Munich), Philippe Collas (University of Oslo, Norway) and Marek

Bartkuhn (JLU Giessen) succeeded in identifying the chaperone complex of the primate specific

histone variant H3.Y allowing further insights into the deposition mechanisms of another closely

related and in cancer frequently mutated histone variant H3.3.

 

https://academic.oup.com/nar/article-lookup/doi/10.1093/nar/gkx131

 

 

February 2017

All you want (and need) to know about histone variants….

 

 

Marcus Buschbeck (Josep Carreras Leukemia Research Institute, Badalona, Spain) and Sandra

Hake have published a seminal review article on histone variants and their roles in cell fate

decisions and cancer in Nature Reviews Molecular Cell Biology

(see also http://www.nature.com/nrm/journal/v18/n5/full/nrm.2016.166.html)

 

November 2016

Farewell LMU, Welcome JLU

After ten fantastic, successful and fun years at the LMU, the “molecular biology family” says

“good-buy” to Sandra Hake (alias crazy professor). Mandatory: costumes, cocktails, music,

performances and lots of fun!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Thanks to all former colleagues, alumni and group members (see picture) for organizing such wonderful party!

And thanks to the JLU Giessen for such a warm welcome (see also JLU Uniforum February 2017 issue

http://geb.uni-giessen.de/geb/volltexte/2017/12493/

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