Dr. Joe Qiao Delivers Special CRS Fall Seminar
On November 5th, the CRS community was joined by Dr. Joe (Huanyu) Qiao, PhD, Assistant Professor, Department of Comparative Biosciences, College of Veterinary Medicine, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign for a special Fall seminar. Dr. Qiao presented an engaging talk titled, “One ring to rule them all: RNF212 makes oocytes remember damage” where he discussed his group's focus on understanding key regulators in meiotic checkpoint pathways in gametes.
Dr. Qiao’s research group has made exciting advancements in our understanding of meiotic check point regulations by uncovering the role of the SUMO E3-ligase, RNF212, in an oocyte quality control mechanism. RNF212 appears to impede DNA break repair between sister chromatids which allows for oocytes to retain a “memory” of defective chromosome interactions. To address these important questions in oocyte chromosome integrity, Dr. Qiao’s group utilized spatial and temporal imaging approaches to understand the conformational changes of meiotic chromosomes and how those arrangements impact chromosome pairing, recombination, segregation, and transcription. With a combination of innovative microscopy and imaging analysis approaches and murine knockout model systems, Dr. Qiao was able to engage our CRS community in an expanded understanding of the nuances of meiosis checkpoints and elegantly displayed the ability of molecular machinery to impart molecular memories on chromosomes in the female gamete.
Hailing from a sister Illinois institution, Dr. Qiao brought some fantastic science to our CRS community for a fall seminar special treat and we look forward to seeing where the future of these innovative studies will go.