Prof. Dr. Janine Kirstein

Prof. Dr. Kirstein got her diploma in Biology from the University of Greifswald, and obtained her PhD at the Freie Universität Berlin. She was a postdoctoral fellow at Northwestern University, USA and set up her independent lab in 2013 at the Leibniz Research Institute for Molecular Pharmacology in Berlin. In 2019 she was appointed as professor at the University of Bremen. Janine Kirstein’s research focus is on mechanistic studies of molecular chaperones, ageing and neurodegeneration. For that, she employs diverse models ranging from in vitro purified chaperones and amyloid proteins, to C. elegans and mammalian cell culture. 

Research interests:

• Molecular chaperones        
• Neurodegenerative diseases
• Ageing

Selected publications: 

• Gallrein C, Iburg M, Michelberger T, Koçak A, Puchkov D, Liu F, Ayala Mariscal SM, Nayak T, Kaminski Schierle GS & Kirstein J Novel Amyloid-beta pathology C. elegans model reveals distinct neurons as seeds of pathogenicity Progress in Neurobiology, Sep 11:101907

• Scior A, Arnsburg K, Iburg M, Juenemann K, Mlody B, Pigazzini ML, Buntru A, Puchkov D, Wanker EE, Prigione A, Priller J & Kirstein J Complete suppression of Htt aggregation and disaggregation of Htt fibrils by a specific trimeric chaperone complex. The EMBO Journal, 2018; 37(2)282-299

• Kreis P*, Gallrein C, Rojas-Puente E, Mack TGA, Kroon C, Dinkel V, Willmes C, Murk K, tom-Dieck S, Schuman EM, Kirstein J*, Eickholt BJ* ATM phosphorylation of the actin-binding protein drebrin controls oxidation stress-resistance and lifespan. Nature Communications, 2019 10(1):486 (*co-corresponding authors)