Dominik Paquet – iPSC-models of brain diseases

Dominik Paquet, Principal investigator

Dominik established the PaquetLab at ISD in 2017, after he was appointed Professor for Neurobiology at LMU Munich and became a member of the Munich Cluster for Systems Neurology (SyNergy). He received his BSc and MSc from the Eberhard-Karls-University Tübingen, Germany. During his MSc Dominik worked with Henry Roehl at the MRC Centre for Developmental Genetics in Sheffield, UK. For his PhD, Dominik developed the first Tau-transgenic zebrafish model to study mechanisms of Tau-related neurodegeneration with Christian Haass at LMU Munich. After working with Thomas Misgeld at TU Munich for 2 years on in vivo imaging to study mitochondrial transport defects in neurodegenerative diseases, Dominik joined the lab of Marc Tessier-Lavigne at The Rockefeller University in NYC as a New York Stem Cell Foundation Druckenmiller Fellow. There, he pioneered the use of CRISPR/Cas9 gene editing in induced pluripotent stem cells to study diseases of the human brain.

E-Mail: Dominik.Paquet@med.uni-muenchen.de
Phone: +49 89 4400 46123

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Julien Klimmt, GSN graduate student

Julien was born and raised in Chemnitz, Germany. He received his BSc in Human Biology from the University of Greifswald in 2014 and a MSc in Molecular Biosciences with a major in neurosciences at the University of Heidelberg. During his Master’s he worked at Harvard Medical School with Dr. Matthew J. LaVoie on the cytosolic function of Parkin. In 2017 he finished his Master’s degree working on epigenetic mechanisms in memory formation and then joined the PaquetLab as a graduate student. He is now working on complex cell culture systems using CRISPR/Cas9-edited, iPSC-derived brain cells to model AD.

E-Mail: Julien.Klimmt@med.uni-muenchen.de
Phone: +49 89 4400 46223

Isabel Weisheit, GSN graduate student

Isabel grew up in Augsburg, Germany. She obtained her BSc in Biochemistry from the University of Ulm and her MSc from LMU Munich. For her master’s thesis she joined the group of Prof. Jernej Ule at the Francis Crick Institute in London, where she studied the RNA-binding properties of TDP-43. Isabel started in the PaquetLab in April 2017 as a graduate student and is focusing on using CRISPR/Cas9-edited iPSCs to establish in vitro models of vascular dysfunction.

E-Mail: Isabel.Weisheit@med.uni-muenchen.de
Phone: +49 89 4400 46222

Dennis Crusius, BTA

Dennis is from Munich, where he also obtained his BTA degree. He joined the PaquetLab as a research assistant in November 2017 and is involved in several projects from stem cell differentiation to CRISPR/Cas9 genome editing. He also contributes to a functional lab environment and supports the entire team in multiple ways.

E-Mail: Dennis.Crusius@med.uni-muenchen.de
Phone: +49 89 4400 46224

Angelika Dannert, GSN graduate student

Angelika grew up near Ulm in Germany. She studied Molecular Medicine and obtained her BSc from the University of Tübingen, and her MSc from the University of Göttingen, Germany. During her studies she did international research internships at Free University Amsterdam, University of Zürich, and Stanford University. During her master’s she worked on iPSC-based models of depression followed by her thesis on prevention of vascular stiffening. She joined the PaquetLab in December 2018 and is working on the development of complex in vitro models of FTD using CRISPR/Cas9-edited iPSC-derived brain cells.

E-Mail: Angelika.Dannert@med.uni-muenchen.de
Phone: +49 89 4400 46223

Judit Gonzalez Gallego, GSN graduate student, collaboration with Dichgans Lab, ISD

Judit is a native of Spain. She obtained her BSc in biochemistry from the Autonomous University of Barcelona. After completing her bachelors degree, she worked for one year at the Center of Neurobiology of Hamburg University with Dr. Marina Mikhaylova in protein neuronal transport. Currently, she is a fast-track student in the Graduate School of Systemic Neuroscience (GSN) and after performing a research internship in PaquetLab on CRISPR/Cas9 genome editing she decided to join the ISD in October 2018 for a PhD project in neurovascular disorders co-supervised by Martin Dichgans and Dominik Paquet.

E-Mail: Judit.Gonzalez@med.uni-muenchen.de
Phone: +49 89 4400 46177

Liliana Pedro, GSN graduate student, collaboration with Simons Lab, DZNE

Liliana was born in Portugal. She received her BSc in Biochemistry (2011) and her MSc in Molecular Biotechnology (2013) from the University of Aveiro, Portugal. For her Master Thesis she worked to establish the role of trace elements in the structure and metabolism of connective tissues at the Medical Research Council in Cambridge, UK. After her Master, she remained in Cambridge working as a research assistant applying her expertise in the optical emission spectroscopy analysis of biological samples. In 2015 she joined Prof. Ulrike Gaul lab at the Gene Center in Munich investigating the blood brain barrier development in Drosophila melanogaster. At the moment she doing her PhD in Prof. Mikael Simons group, studying oligodendrocyte myelination in development and adults, in a collaborative project with the PaquetLab.

E-Mail: Liliana.Pedro-Domingues@dzne.de
Phone: +49 89 4400 46480

Joseph Kroeger, GSN graduate student, collaboration with Dichgans Lab, ISD

Joseph grew up in the U.S. state of North Carolina. He earned a BSc in mathematics and chemistry with minors in physics and philosophy from Wingate University. After graduating from Wingate University, he moved to Munich and became a master’s student with the GSN. For his master’s thesis, he is working on approaches to apply CRISPR/Cas genomic editing to investigate the role of stroke-associated genes in iPSC-derived models.

E-Mail: Joseph.Kroeger@med-uni-muenchen.de
Phone: +49 89 4400 46224

Sophie Robinson, GSN graduate student, collaboration with Haass Lab, DZNE

Sophie is from the Bay Area in California, USA. She received her BSc in Psychology and Biological Sciences from Carnegie Mellon University. In high school, she had internships at Stanford University with Dr. Tony Wyss-Coray studying AD. During her Bachelor's, she worked with Dr. Stephen Strittmatter at Yale University investigating a Fyn kinase inhibitor as a potential treatment in AD mouse models, which has subsequently made it into clinical trials. After graduating from college, she worked in a cancer immunotherapy lab under Dr. Ron Levy at Stanford University and in clinical operations at Roche Genentech. Sophie is a GSN Fast-Track student and started a rotation at the PaquetLab in February 2019. She is interested in studying microglia in homeostatic and disease-associated states, co-supervised by Christian Haass and Dominik Paquet.

E-Mail: Sophie.Robinson@med-uni-muenchen.de
Phone: +49 89 4400 46224

Carolina Cardoso Goncalves, graduate student

Carolina grew up in a small town near Coimbra, Portugal. She obtained her BSc in Biochemistry and her MSc in Cellular and Molecular Biology from the University of Coimbra, Portugal. During her studies she did internships at Centre Hospitalier Universitaire Vaudois in Lausanne, Karolinska Institute in Stockholm and University of Lausanne. For her master´s thesis she joined the group of Prof. Paola Bezzi at the University of Lausanne, Switzerland, where she studied the mechanisms underlying the control of dopamine homeostasis in astrocytes from the prefrontal cortex. After her Masters she worked as a Junior Research Fellow investigating the role of astrocyte-induced neural microenvironment remodeling in neural 3D cell models at the Animal Cell Technology Unit of iBET and ITQB-NOVA in Lisbon, Portugal. Carolina joined the PaquetLab in September 2019 and is currently working on the development of dynamic 3D cell cultures to model AD.

E-Mail: Carolina.Cardoso@med.uni-muenchen.de
Phone: +49 89 4400 46225

Katja Salbaum, Master student

Katja Salbaum was born in Vilsbiburg and obtained her B. Sc. in Molecular Biotechnology at the TU Munich. During that time, she spent one term abroad at Aston University studying Chemical Engineering and completed additional internships at the Fraunhofer IVV, Leibniz Institute for Plant Genetics and Crop Plant Research and worked as a research assistant at new_diagnostics GmbH. In the course of the elite master’s programme Biomedical Neuroscience, she completed a lab rotation at the Pennington Biomedical Research Center in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, supported by a scholarship from the Bavarian Ministry for Science and Art. For her master’s thesis she has joined the PaquetLab to establish an efficient system for generating knockouts of disease-relevant genes in human iPSC-derived cortical neurons.

E-Mail: Katja.Salbaum@med.uni-muenchen.de
Phone: +49 89 4400 46222

Annika Wagener, Master student

Annika grew up near Konstanz, Germany, after which she moved to Scotland to obtain a B.Sc. Hons in Neuroscience from the University of Glasgow. Currently, she is pursuing a master’s degree in Molecular Biosciences with a major in Neuroscience from the University of Heidelberg. As part of her studies, she carried out research at the Department of Neurobiology and the Spinal Cord Injury Center in Heidelberg, and has spent a semester working with Prof. Per Nilsson at the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm to characterise a novel protease involved in APP cleavage in a triple KI mouse model of AD. For her master’s thesis, Annika has joined the Paquet lab to work on improving CRISPR/Cas9 mediated genome editing in iPSC models of neurodegeneration. ​

E-Mail: Annika.Wagener@med.uni-muenchen.de
Phone: +49 89 4400 46222

Jennifer Sandrina Yilmaz, lab manager

Jenny was born in Rosenheim, Germany. She graduated in 2015 as a chemistry lab technician and worked as a laboratory lubricant assistant for several years. After travelling for one year, she wanted to change to the clinical field and joined the Paquet Lab in October 2019, where she supports the team in a variety of ways in organizing and structuring the laboratory and actively participates in stem cell differentiation and molecular biological methods. 

E-Mail: Jennifer.Yilmaz@med.uni-muenchen.de
Phone: +49 89 4400 46026

Samantha Ho, Undergraduate researcher

Samantha was born in Vancouver, Canada and raised partially in Taiwan. She obtained her BSc in Neuroscience from the University of Alberta in 2018. During her undergraduate studies, she completed her Bachelor's thesis in Dr. Ian Winship's laboratory, investigating endogenous pleiotrophin expression after photothrombotic stroke in a mouse model. In October 2018, she became a master's student at the Graduate School of Systemic Neurosciences (GSN). Currently, she joins the PaquetLab to establish CRISPR-Cas9 gene-edited iPS cell lines for studying microglia under homeostatic and disease-associated states. 

Ioanna Emmanouilidis, GSN undergraduate researcher, collaboration with DichgansLab, ISD

Ioanna was born and raised in Athens, Greece. She received her BSc on Life Sciences from Pierre and Marie Curie University in Paris in 2018. During her undergraduate studies, she spent a semester at Karolinska Institut in Stockholm where she did a research internship on insulin signaling and genetic risk factors related to Alzheimer’s disease. Currently, she is a first-year master’s student at the Graduate School of Systemic Neurosciences (GSN-LMU) and works on the role of stroke-associated genes in iPSC-derived models.

Andrea Stüven, Team Assistant

Andrea joined the PaquetLab in 2018 and supported the research team as Team Assistant. When not at work she enjoyed going to the opera and concerts, visiting art exhibitions, working in her garden and swimming. She also stays connected with family and friends from across the world as much as possible.

Sarah Hübner, undergraduate researcher

Sarah was born in Augsburg, Germany. After completing her BSc in Chemistry and Biochemistry at LMU Munich, she did a research internship at University of California Berkeley. There, she worked with Prof. Evan W. Miller on voltage-sensitive fluorescent dyes and also joined the lab of Prof. Christopher J. Chang developing fluorescent copper(I) sensors. Currently, she proceeds with her master’s studies at LMU Munich. She joined the PaquetLab in April 2018 to study CRISPR/Cas9 edited iPSCs as a model system for neurovascular disorders.

Johannes Heim, undergraduate researcher

Johannes comes from a small town in the south of Munich. He studies medicine at LMU Munich. During the preclinical stage of his studies he did an internship in molecular neurophysiology in Prof. Michael Meyers Lab at LMU Munich. With an intrinsic interest in neurology and vascular medicine, he gained experience in these fields during clinical electives. Johannes worked on a collaborative project between the DichgansLab and PaquetLab to investigate the role of endothelial cells in ischemic stroke.