CONICET PhD fellow
Director: Eduardo Garbarino Pico
E-mail: mmalcolm@fcq.unc.edu.ar
PhD Thesis Topic
Circadian regulation of Stress granules and Processing bodies
Circadian rhythms are biological oscillations with periods close to 24 h. They are generated by internal mechanisms named biological clocks. Stress granules (SGs) and Processing bodies (PBs) are cytoplasmic ribonucleoprotein aggregates involved in mARN translation and stability control. We have observed that the number, area, and signal intensity of SGs and PBs vary along time in NIH/3T3. We have hypothesized that SGs and PBs are modulated by circadian clocks and this would contribute to the circadian regulation of gene expression and stress response. The goal of my thesis project is to study how these oscillations are generated and their role on cell physiology.
NIH/3T3 and immortalized fibroblast cultures from clock gene knockout mices will be used. We plan to: 1) To analyze the temporal regulation of SG and PB in wt and KO fibroblast cultures for determining whether they are regulated by the circadian clock. 2) To silence candidate factors that could be responsible of the temporal regulation of SG and PB oscillations for analyzing its role. 3) To determine whether clock gene and/or clock controlled messengers are processed in SGs or PBs. 4) To analyze a potential SG contribution in the circadian regulation of stress response.