Cardoso Lab

People

Lab Members

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Group Leader

M. Cristina Cardoso graduated in biology at the University of Lisbon, Portugal (1986). After finishing her doctoral thesis on phage molecular genetics (1990), she went on to her post-doctoral training in the group of Dr. B. Nadal-Ginard at the Harvard Medical School (Boston, USA) where she worked on inducing retro-differentiation in terminally differentiated cells. During this time, she started to explore the interplay between the mammalian cell nucleus landscape and (epi)genome metabolism. In 1995, she became a group leader at the Franz Volhard Clinic (Charité-Berlin, Germany) and from 1997 to 2008 at the Max Delbrück Center for Molecular Medicine (Berlin). Since 2008, she has established her group at the Technische Universität Darmstadt.

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Secretary

Katrin Schallert is responsible to manage the secretariat of the work group. She is in charge for accounting and secretary matters. Accounting includes in particular the facts and figures of the research projects and in administrative matters. In the secretary, she is responsible among other things, to purchase lab and office material, doing the bills and taking care about personnel matters.

Diana Imblan graduated in environment protection at the School of Applied Sciences in Bingen. She is working as a technical assistant in the Cardoso lab and takes care of several databases (Library of papers, Inventory lists, Peptides) and is supporting our PhD`s in molecular cloning.

Manuela Milden-Appel studied Biotechnology at the University of Applied Sciences Darmstadt, Germany. Her diploma thesis was finished in 2008 in the department of molecular biology. Now she takes care of the biochemistry lab, the antibodies and our Äkta system.

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Milden-Appel, M.#, Paravicini, M.#,*, Milden, J. P., Schüßler, M., Jakoby, R. and Cardoso, M. C.* (2024). Uptake of substances into living mammalian cells by microwave induced perturbation of the plasma membrane. Sci. Rep. 14: 20885.

Paravicini, M., Milden, M., Frank, L. M. P. P., Schüßler, M., Cardoso, M. C., Jakoby, R. and Hessinger, C. (2022). Broadband Microwave Electroporation Device for the Analysis of the Influence of Frequency, Temperature and Electrical Field Strength. 44th Annual International Conference of the IEEE Engineering in Medicine & Biology Society (EMBC): 1565-1568. doi: 10.1109/EMBC48229.2022.9871912.

Zhang, H. #, Romero, H. #, Schmidt, A., Gagova, K. Qin, W., Bertulat, B., Lehmkuhl, A., Milden, M., Eck, M., Meckel, T., Leonhardt, H. and Cardoso, M. C. (2022). MeCP2-induced heterochromatin organization is driven by oligomerization-based liquid-liquid phase separation and restricted by DNA methylation. Nucleus 13: 1-34 .

Bertulat, B., De Bonis, M. L., Della Ragione, F., Lehmkuhl, A., Milden, M., Storm, C., Jost, K. L., Scala, S., Hendrich, B., D'esposito, M. and Cardoso, M. C. (2012). MeCP2 dependent heterochromatin reorganization during neural differentiation of a novel Mecp2-deficient embryonic stem cell reporter line. PLoS One 7: e47848.

Jost, K. L., Rottach, A., Milden, M., Bertulat, B., Becker, A., Wolf, P., Sandoval, J., Petazzi, P., Huertas, D., Esteller, M., Kremmer, E., Leonhardt, H. and Cardoso, M. C. (2011). Generation and Characterization of Rat and Mouse Monoclonal Antibodies Specific for MeCP2 and Their Use in X-Inactivation Studies. PLoS One 6: e26499.

María C Arroyo López (Postdoc) graduated in Biological Sciences, with a Master in Biotechnology and Biomedicine (2008-2013) and Molecular and Cellular Biology PhD at the University of Jaen, Spain (2014-2018). Her research work was focused in MCPH1 gene, functional analysis in chromosome condensation and cell cycle control (Human Genetics Department). She also worked during an internship at Dr. Duncan Clarke lab (Department of Genetics, Cell Biology and Development, University of Minnesota) investigating the functional interplay between TopoisomeraseII and MCPH1 regulating the G2 Decatenation Checkpoint. In July 2019 she joined Prof. Cristina Cardoso´s group to continue its scientific calling investigating epigenetic regulation. Specifically, she focuses on DNA modifications and the role of TET enzymes maintaining 5mC oxidation products. In her spare time, Maria enjoys climbing and drawing.

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Arroyo, M., Casas-Delucchi, C. S., Pabba, M. K., Prorok, P., Pradhan, S. K., Rausch, C., Lehmkuhl, A., Maiser, A., Buschbeck, M., Pasque, V., Bernstein, E., Luck, K. and Cardoso, M. C. (2024). Histone variant macroH2A1 regulates synchronous firing of replication origins in the inactive X chromosome. Nucleic Acids Res. 52: 11659-11688.

Arroyo, M., Cardoso, M. C. and Hastert, F. D. (2023). In situ quantification of cytosine modification levels in heterochromatic domains of cultured mammalian cells. Bio Protoc. 13: e4716.

Arroyo, M., Hastert, F. D., Zhadan, A., Schelter, F., Zimbelmann, S., Rausch, C., Ludwig, A. K., Carell, T. and Cardoso, M. C. (2022). Isoform-specific and ubiquitination dependent recruitment of Tet1 to replicating heterochromatin modulates methylcytosine oxidation. Nat. Commun. 13: 5173.

Arroyo, M., Sánchez, A., Cañuelo, A., Heredia-Molina, R. F., Martínez-Molina, E., Clarke, D. J., and Marchal, J. A. (2020). MCPH1 Lack of Function Enhances Mitotic Cell Sensitivity Caused by Catalytic Inhibitors of Topo II. Genes 11: 406.

Arroyo, M., Canuelo, A,. Calahorra, J., Hastert, F. D., Sanchez, A., Clarke, D. J. and Marchal, J. A. (2020). Mitotic entry upon Topo II catalytic inhibition is controlled by Chk1 and Plk1. FEBS J. 287: 4933.

Arroyo, M., Kuriyama, R., Guerrero, I., Keifenheim, D., Cañuelo, A., Calahorra, J., Marchal, J. A. (2019). MCPH1 is essential for cellular adaptation to the G 2 -phase decatenation checkpoint. The FASEB Journal 33: 8363-8374.

Arroyo, M., Kuriyama, R., Trimborn, M., Keifenheim, D., Cañuelo, A., Sánchez, A., Marchal, J. A. (2017). MCPH1, mutated in primary microcephaly, is required for efficient chromosome alignment during mitosis. Scientific Reports 7.

Arroyo, M., Trimborn, M., Sánchez, A., Hirano, T., Neitzel, H., & Marchal, J. A. (2015). Chromosome structure deficiencies in MCPH1 syndrome. Chromosoma 124: 491–501.

Ishita Jain graduated obtained her B-tech + M-tech in Biotechnology from Apeejay stya university in 2023. Her masters thesis focused upon the structural and functional analysis of Heterochromatin Protein 1 alpha. In the same year in November 2023 she joined the laboratory of Prof. Cardoso in the cell and epigenetics research group of TU Darmstadt as a PhD student, and she is working on DNA damage and repair upon UV irradiation.

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Sadaf, Najm M. Z., Shingatgeri, V. M., Uddin, M., Izhari, M. A., Akhtar, M. S., Kathait, A., Kar, S., Jain, I., Datt, P., Komal, K. and Sharma, A. (2020). The Pivotal Role of Senescence in Cell Death and Aging: Where Do We Stand? Current Molecular Biology Reports 6: 91-101.

Maliwan Kamkaew graduated with a Bachelor's degree in Microbiology from Silpakorn University and a Master’s degree in Molecular Genetics and Genetic Engineering from Mahidol University in Thailand. During her master’s study, her thesis focused on the functional characterization of dengue RdRp complexed with RNA. She also completed an internship at Harvard Medical School in Boston, USA. In 2018, she returned to Boston, working in fields such as antibody discovery, immunotherapy, and mycobacterial physiology at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and Tufts School of Medicine. In September 2024, she joined Prof. Cardoso's group to pursue a PhD, focusing on DNA replication stress, particularly how the replisome responds to DNA-protein cross-links.

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Chang MR, Ke H, Miguéns LL, Coherd C, Nguyen K, Kamkaew M, Johnson R, Storm N, Honko A, Zhu Q, Griffiths A, Marasco WA. The variable conversion of neutralizing anti-SARS-CoV-2 single chain antibodies to IgG provides insight into RBD epitope accessibility. (2023) Protein Engineering, Design, and Selection. doi: 10.1093/protein/gzad008

Phongkitkarun K*, Chusorn P*, Kamkaew M, Lam EW, Promptmas C, Sampattavanich S. (2023) Chemically Tunable FOXM1-D Sensor Revealed FOXM1 Direct Influence on Cell Cycle.
bioRxiv doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/2023.03.01.530713

Chung ES*, Kar P*, Kamkaew M, Amir A#, Aldridge BB#. (2023) Mycobacterium tuberculosis grows linearly at the single-cell level with larger variability than model organisms.
bioRxiv doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/2023.05.17.541183

Chang MR, Tomasovic L, Kuzmina NA, Ronk AJ, Byrne PO, Johnson R, Storm N, Olmedillas E, Hou YJ, Schäfer A, Leist SR, Tse LV, Ke H, Coherd C, Nguyen K, Kamkaew M, Honko A, Zhu Q, Alter G, Saphire EO, McLellan JS, Griffiths A, Baric RS, Bukreyev A, Marasco WA. (2022) IgG-like bispecific antibodies with potent and synergistic neutralization against circulating SARS-CoV-2 variants of concern. Nature Communications. 3;13(1):5814. doi: 10.1038/s41467-022-33030-4

Harshbarger WD*, Deming D*, Lockbaum GJ, Attatippaholkun N, Kamkaew M, Hou S, Somasundaran M, Wang JP, Finberg RW, Zhu QK, Schiffer CA, Marasco WA (2021) Unique structural solution from a VH3-30 antibody targeting the hemagglutinin stem of influenza A viruses. Nature Communications. 25;12(1):559.
doi: 10.1038/s41467-020-20879-6

Hodge K, Kamkaew M, Pisitkun T, Chimnaronk S (2019) Flavors of Flaviviral RNA Structure: towards an Integrated View of RNA Function from Translation through Encapsidation. BioEssays.41(8):e1900003. doi: 10.1002/bies.201900003

Ogata AF, Maley AM, Wu C, Gilboa T, Norman M, Lazarovits R, Mao CP, Newton G, Chang M, Nguyen K, Kamkaew M, Zhu Q, Gibson TE, Ryan ET, Charles RC, Marasco WA, Walt DR. (2020) Ultra-sensitive Serial Profiling of SARS-CoV-2 Antigens and Antibodies in Plasma to Understand Disease Progression in COVID-19 Patients with Severe Disease. Clinical Chemistry. 8:hvaa213.
doi: 10.1093/clinchem/hvaa213

Hodge K*, Tunghirun C*, Kamkaew M, Limjindaporn T, Yenchitsomanus PT, Chimnaronk S (2016) Identification of a Conserved RNA-dependent RNA Polymerase (RdRp)-RNA Interface Required for Flaviviral Replication. Journal of Biological Chemistry.12;291(33):17437-49. doi: 10.1074/jbc.m116.724013

Kamkaew M, Chimnaronk S (2015) Characterization of soluble RNA-dependent RNA polymerase from dengue virus serotype 2: The polyhistidine tag compromises the polymerase activity. Protein Expression and Purification 112: 43-49. doi: 10.1016/j.pep.2015.04.008

Ksenia Kolobynina (Postdoc) joined Cardoso group as a PhD student in July 2017 and is currently focusing on discovering novel regulators of chromatin response to DNA damage with means of ubiquitinome wide screening and fluorescent microscopy. She studied biology at the Kazan Federal University, Russia, to obtain her bachelor degree with a focus on genetics in 2015. Meanwhile she got research experience in the lab of Prof. Dr. Barbara Schmidt in University of Regensburg, Germany, being a part of the project aiming to test HIV mimetic peptides. She did her master thesis at the Institute of Fundamental Medicine and Biology, Kazan, investigating potential role of human CHP3 protein in stem cell differentiation process under supervision of Prof. Albert Rizvanov.

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Pabba, M. K.#, Ritter, C.#, Chagin, V. O.#, Meyer, J., Celikay, K., Stear, J. H., Loerke, D., Kolobynina, K., Prorok, P., Schmid, A. K., Leonhardt, H., Rohr, K and Cardoso, M. C. (2023) Replisome loading reduces chromatin motion independent of DNA synthesis eLife 12: RP87572.

Qin, W., Steinek, C., Kolobynina, K., Forne, I., Imhof, A., Cardoso, M. C. and Leonhardt, H. (2022). Probing protein ubiquitination in live cells. Nucleic Acids Res. 50: e125.

Kolobynina, K. G., Rapp, A. and Cardoso, M. C. (2022). Chromatin ubiquitination guides DNA double-strand break signaling and repair. Front. Cell Dev. Biol. 10: 928113.

Schwach, J., Kolobynina, K., Brandstetter, K., Gerlach, M., Ochtrop, P., Helma, J., Hackenberger, C. P. R., Harz, H., Cardoso, M. C. Leonhardt, H. and Stengl, A. (2021). Site-specific antibody fragment conjugates for reversible staining in fluorescence microscopy. ChemBioChem 22: 1205-1209.

Kolobynina, K. G., Solovyeva, V. V., Levay, K., Rizvanov, A. A. and Slepak, V. Z. (2016). Emerging roles of the single EF-hand Ca2+ sensor tescalcin in the regulation of gene expression, cell growth and differentiation. J Cell Sci 129: 3533-3540.

Marah Mahmoud holds a Bachelor's degree in Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Chemistry from Damascus University, Syria, which she obtained in 2019. Subsequently, she pursued a Master's degree in Medical Biotechnology at the Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology, Russia, completing her studies in 2022. During her master's program, Marah focused on developing therapy for malignant gliomas using non-pathogenic Polioviruses and Vaccinia Virus. In February 2024, Marah Mahmoud started her doctoral journey by joining the Laboratory of Prof. Cardoso at the TU Darmstadt. Within the cell and epigenetics research group, her research will concentrate on exploring DNA methylation, methyl readers, and heterochromatin architecture dynamics during cellular differentiation processes and in various disease states.

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Shakiba, Y., Vorobyev, P., Mahmoud, M., Hamad, A., Kochetkov, D., Yusubalieva, G., Baklaushev, V., Chumakov, P. and Lipatova, A. (2023). Recombinant Strains of Oncolytic Vaccinia Virus for Cancer Immunotherapy. Biochemistry (Moscow). 88. 823-841.

Hamad, A., Soboleva, A. V., Vorobyev, P. O., Mahmoud, M., Vasilenko, K. V. and Chumakov, P. M. (2022). Development of a recombinant oncolytic poliovirus type 3 strain with altered cell tropism. Bulletin of RSMU. no. 2, p. 5–10.

Nikitina, A. S., Lipatova, A. V., Goncharov, A. O., Kliuchnikova, A. A., Pyatnitskiy, M. A., Kuznetsova, K. G., Hamad, A., Vorobyev, P. O., Alekseeva, O. N., Mahmoud, M., Shakiba, Y., Anufrieva, K. S., Arapidi, G. P., Ivanov, M. V., Tarasova, I. A., Gorshkov, M. V., Chumakov, P. M. and Moshkovskii, S. A. (2022). Multiomic Profiling Identified EGF Receptor Signaling as a Potential Inhibitor of Type I Interferon Response in Models of Oncolytic Therapy by Vesicular Stomatitis Virus. International Journal of Molecular Sciences. 23, no. 9: 5244.

Maruthi Kumar Pabba started his bachelor from the Indian Institute of Technology Raipur, India, in 2013. He obtained his master's degree in biology from the Indian Institute of Technology Gandhinagar, India, in 2019. He joined the Cardoso group for his master thesis as a DAAD Exchange student in September 2018 where his research focus was to study the human Ubiquitin E3 Ligases and their role in DNA damage and repair. He joined the Cardoso lab as a Ph.D. to investigate the regulation of mammalian genome architecture and mobility. We will manipulate epigenetic states and subnuclear spatial localization using synthetic biology approaches. Subsequently, we will test how these impact genome architecture and mobility.

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Ritter, C., Lee, J.-Y., Pham, M.-T., Pabba, M. K., Cardoso, M. C., Bartenschlager, R. and Rohr, K. (2024). Multi-detector fusion and bayesian smoothing for tracking viral and chromatin structures. Med. Image Anal. 97: 103227.

Pabba, M. K., Meyer, J., Celikay, K., Schermelleh, L., Rohr, K. and Cardoso, M. C. (2024). DNA choreography: correlating mobility and organization of DNA across different resolutions from loops to chromosomes. Histochem. Cell Biol. 162: 109-131.

# First Authors

Mamberti, S., Pabba, M. K., Rapp, A., Cardoso, M. C.# and Scholz, M.# (2022). The chromatin architectural protein CTCF is critical for cell survival upon irradiation-induced DNA damage. Int. J. Mol. Sci. 23: 3896.

# Corresponding authors

Sunil Kumar Pradhan received his BS-MS dual degree in Biological Sciences from Indian Institute of Science Education and Research (IISER) Kolkata, India. His master thesis was focused on intraspecific competition of sibling colonies of Bacillus cereus. He also worked at the University of Zurich to study epigenetic regulated metabolism in brown adipose tissues. He started his Ph.D. in Cardoso lab to work on the (epi)genetic regulated replication progression and model of mammalian replication progression.

plays flute with the BiophoniX

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Pradhan, S. K. , Lozoya, T., Prorok, P., Yuan, Y., Lehmkuhl. A., Zhang, P. and Cardoso, M. C. (2024). Developmental changes in genome replication progression in pluripotent versus differentiated human cells. Genes 15: 305.

Pradhan, S. K. and Cardoso, M. C. (2023). Analysis of cell cycle and DNA compaction dependent subnuclear distribution of histone marks. Methods Mol Biol. 2589: 225-239.

Laura Schulte graduated with a bachelor’s degree in biotechnology from h_da University of Applied Sciences in 2023. Her bachelor thesis, which she wrote at the GSI Helmholtz center for heavy ion research, focused on methods of cell culture and radiation biology in the context of cancer research. She subsequently began her master’s degree at TU Darmstadt, joining the Cardoso Lab in 2024 to research the stress response of replisome factors in embryonic stem cells and graduated in 2025.

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nin, K.

Qin Qinghua graduated from Shihezi University (China) with a bachelor's degree in 2019. In the same year, he joined the Infection and Immunity research group of Qilu School of Medicine, Shandong University (China), and studied for a master's degree in Prof. Qiu Chunhong's laboratory. His master's research focused on the intervention effect of visible light on colitis. In June 2022, he defended his master thesis and obtained M.Sc. After that, in August 2023, he joined the laboratory of Prof. Cardoso in the cell and epigenetics research group of TU Darmstadt as a PhD student, and he is working on DNA damage and repair upon UV irradiation.

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Alexander Rapp (Postdoc) graduated in biochemistry at the Friedrich Schiller University in Jena, Germany, with a diploma thesis on assessing DNA damage after laser micro beams using the Comet-FISH assay. During this time he got experience on different multi photon laser beams and their use for micromanipulation and damage induction. After that he did his PhD in Molecular Biology at the Institute of Molecular Biotechnology (IMB) in Jena in the Group of K.O. Greulich (until 2004). In 2005 he went to the Sir William Dunn School of Pathology, University of Oxford, UK as a Marie Curie Fellow in the lab of P. Cook. During this time he studied the effects of radiation induced DNA damage in dependency on chromatin structure. In 2008 he joined the Cardoso group at the TU Darmstadt for his habilitation in the field of DNA repair and chromatin.

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Hector Romero (Postdoc) graduated in biology in 2012 at the Complutense University of Madrid. During his master degree in biochemistry, obtained in Madrid in 2013, he studied the effect of HGF on the first steps of malignancy of oval cells treated with TGF-β. He did his PhD shared between the group of Juan Alonso at the National Centre of Biotechnology of Spain and Prof. Peter Graumann at Phillips-Universität Marburg, where he defend his thesis in 2018 based on the genetic and single-molecule characterization of two factors involved in DNA replication and repair in Bacillus subtilis . Since 2019, he is in Prof. Cristina Cardoso‘s group analyzing how chromatin compartimentalization is affecting protein dynamics and the factors involved in the process.

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Romero, H., Schmidt, A. and Cardoso, M. C. (2023). Protein level quantification across fluorescence-based platforms. Bio Protoc. 13: e4834.

Zhang, H., Qin, W., Romero, H., Leonhardt, H. and Cardoso, M. C. (2023). Heterochromatin organization and phase separation. Nucleus 14: 1-13.

# First Authors

Romero, H., Serrano, E., Hernández-Tamayo, R., Carrasco, B., Cárdenas, PP., Ayora, S., Graumann, PL., Alonso, JC. (2020) Bacillus subtilis RarA Acts as a Positive RecA Accessory Protein. Front Microbiol. Feb 13 :11:92.

Romero, H., Torres, R., Hernandez-Tamayo, R., Carrasco, B., Ayora, S., Graumann, P. L., Alonso, J.C. (2019) Bacillus subtilis RarA acts at the interplay between replication and repair-by-recombination. DNA repair 78: 27-36.

Torres, R., Romero, H., Rodriguez-Cerrato, V. and Alonso, J.C. (2017) Interplay between Bacillus subtilis RecD2 and the RecG and RuvAB helicase in recombinational repair. DNA repair 55: 44-46.

Romero, H., Rösch, T., Hernandez-Tamayo, R., Lucena, D., Ayora, S., Alonso, J.C. and Graumann, P. (2019) Single molecule tracking reveals function of RarA at replication forks but also independently from replication during DNA repair in Bacillus subtilis. Sci Reports 9: 1997.

Andreas Zhadan began his studies with Biology at the Technical University of Darmstadt in 2016, and obtained his Master degree in 2021. He joined the Cardoso Lab for his bachelor thesis, where he researched the influence of solar radiation on cells. For his Master thesis, he investigated the regulatory role of the zinc finger domain of Tet1 (Ten-eleven translocation protein 1), as well as the regulation of the cancer-related short isoform of Tet1 throughout the cell cycle. In 2021, he started his PhD at the Cardoso Lab, where he will be investigating the regulation of DNA modifications and modifiers, mainly focusing on the role of Tet1.

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Hui Zhang (Postdoc) graduated in Biology at Harbin Institute of Technology (HIT) in China as a Master student in 2017. His Master Thesis involved the functions of Marveld1 (MARVEL domain containing protein 1) during mouse placenta development and underlying molecular mechanisms. In 2017 he joined the Cardoso Lab for his PhD. Here he will focus on the underlying mechanism of Mecp2 (methyl-CpG binding protein 2) multiple functions during neural differentiation, highlighting the emerging hypothesis underlying various membraneless organelles within cells and particularly nucleus. More recently, the work expands to the MBD protein family.

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Schmidt, A. #, Zhang, H. #, Schmitt, S. #, Rausch, C., Popp, O., Chen, J., Cmarko, D., Butter, F., Dittmar, G., Lermyte, F. and Cardoso, M. C. (2024). The proteome composition and organization of constitutive heterochromatin in mouse tissues. Cells 13: 139.

Zhang, H., Qin, W., Romero, H., Leonhardt, H. and Cardoso, M. C. (2023). Heterochromatin organization and phase separation. Nucleus 14: 1-13.

Schmidt, A., Frei, J., Poetsch, A., Chittka, A., Zhang, H., Aßmann, C., Lehmkuhl, A., Bauer, U.-M., Nuber, U. and Cardoso, M. C. (2022). MeCP2 heterochromatin organization is modulated by arginine methylation and serine phosphorylation. Front. Cell Dev. Biol. 10: 941493.

# First Authors

Schmidt, A.#, Zhang, H.# and Cardoso, M. C. (2020). MeCP2 and chromatin compartmentalization. Cells 9: 878.

Chen, Y., Zhang, H., Han, F., Yue, L., Qiao, C., Zhang, Y., Dou, P., Liu, W. and Li, Y. (2018). The depletion of MARVELD2 leads to murine placenta accreta via integrin β4-dependent trophoblast cell invasion. J. Cell. Physiol 233: 2257-2269.

Cardoso Lab • Technische Universität Darmstadt • Germany

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