Ivan Ahel Lab
CURRENT MEMBERS
Professor Ivan Ahel
Principal Investigator
I obtained my MSc in Molecular Biology at the University of Zagreb, Croatia in 2000, before undertaking a PhD in Biology with thesis work carried out at Yale University, USA, between 2000–2003. My undergraduate and PhD research experience includes the regulation of the DNA damage response in actinomycetes and studies of the mechanisms ensuring the fidelity of protein biosynthesis. In 2004 I joined Cancer Research UK at the London Research Institute (now part of the Francis Crick Institute in London) as a Post-doctoral Fellow in Stephen West’s group investigating the roles of several novel DNA repair factors. In January 2009 I started my first independent position at the Cancer Research UK Manchester Institute. In 2013 we moved our laboratory to the Sir William Dunn School of Pathology, University of Oxford.
ivan.ahel [at] path.ox.ac.uk
+44 (0) 1865 285656
DPhil students
Yang Lu
DPhil student
I obtained my BSc degree in Biological Sciences at the Imperial College London and my MPhil degree in Biochemistry at the University of Cambridge. My prior research experiences have equipped me with a strong foundation in the fields of biochemistry, molecular biology and cellular biology. Currently, I am passionate to investigate the molecular mechanisms underlying ADP-ribosylation on nucleic acids.
yang.lu [at] path.ox.ac.uk
+44 (0) 1865 285655
Lena Duma
DPhil student
I'm a DPhil student in the Ahel lab funded by Cancer Research UK. I obtained my BA in Cells and System Biology at the University of Oxford and MSc in Biomedical and Molecular Sciences Research at King's College London. During my undergraduate studies, I worked briefly in the Ahel lab which sparked my interest in DNA damage response. After my masters during which I worked on DNA damage caused by environmental carcinogens, I returned to Oxford to study the ADPr signalling in DNA damage response.
lena.duma [at] st-hughs.ox.ac.uk
+44 (0) 1865 285655
Josephine Groslambert
DPhil student
I obtained my BSc (Hons) in Molecular Biology from the University of St Andrews in Scotland. For my final year thesis, I investigated an anti-phage immune pathway of bacteria. Following my undergraduate degree, I wanted to study cell signaling pathways relevant to human diseases. Upon obtaining a position in the CRUK Cancer Science program, I joined the Ivan Ahel Lab to work on ADP-ribosylation and genome stability. Specifically, I am using microscopy and immunoblotting to study how ADP-ribosyl hydrolases regulate ADP-ribosylation.
josephine.groslambert [at] path.ox.ac.uk
+44 (0) 1865 285655
Kira Schuetzenhofer
DPhil student
After completing my undergraduate degree in Human Sciences at UCL, which allowed me to specialise in Molecular and Cellular Biology, I did a Research Master’s in the Biochemistry Department at the University of Oxford. There, I was first introduced to the role of post-translational modifications in DNA repair, which led me to start my DPhil at the Ahel lab in 2020 a year later, switching from ubiquitination to ADP-ribosylation. Now, I use live-cell microscopy to study how PARP1 functions in the DNA damage response.
kira.schuetzenhofer [at] lincoln.ox.ac.uk
+44 (0) 1865 285655
Nina Dukic
DPhil student
I carried out my MSc degree in Biotechnology in Medicine at the University of Rijeka, Croatia. I did my master thesis project in the lab of Professor Igor Jurak, where I investigated the role of ADAR1 in herpes simplex virus 1 replication. I started my DPhil in the Ivan Ahel Lab in October 2021, and I am currently working on uncovering the role of ADP-ribosylation signalling in the control of viral infection.
nina.dukic [at] lincoln.ox.ac.uk
+44 (0) 1865 285655
Postdoctoral Researchers
Kang Zhu
Postdoctoral Researcher
I obtained my PhD degree in the Institutes of Biomedical Sciences (IBS) at Fudan University in China. During my PhD period, I was mainly focusing on the regulatory mechanism of the enzymatic activities of NEDD4 family ub ligases, the largest subgroup of HECT type E3s. To continue my interest in posttranslational modifications (PTMs), I subsequently joined Ivan's lab and Dragana's lab as a joint postdoctoral researcher to study another PTM called ADP-ribosylation. Currently, I'm investigating the crosstalk between ubiquitylation and ADP-ribosylation in DNA damage response on biochemical and functional levels.
kang.zhu [at] path.ox.ac.uk
+44 (0) 1865 285655
Rebecca Smith
Postdoctoral Researcher
My research interests lie in understanding the DNA damage response, particularly how these pathways are regulated by PARP1/2 and ADP-ribosylation signalling. I completed my PhD in New Zealand before moving to Germany to pursue a post-doc with Gyula Timinszky who first introduced me to the ADP-ribosylation field. I then moved to Rennes, France to complete a post-doc with Sebastien Huet, gaining expertise in live-cell microscopy techniques and how these can be used to follow repair and signalling processes in real time. My most recent studies have focused on how HPF1 modulates ADPr signalling at sites of DNA damage and how HPF1-dependent histone ADPr is required for chromatin relaxation at sites of DNA breaks, driving the recruitment of repair factors to sites of damage for efficient repair. I joined the Ahel lab to further pursue my interests in ADP-ribosylation and the DNA damage response.
rebecca.smith [at] path.ox.ac.uk
+44 (0) 1865 285655
Osamu Suyari
Postdoctoral Researcher
My research interests revolve around the use of the fruit fly Drosophila melanogaster to elucidate the regulation of molecular and cellular mechanisms to establish new disease models. I obtained my PhD at the Kyoto Institute of Technology, where I identified the target genes of the transcription factor DREF and characterised the Drosophila DNA polymerase epsilon. I then joined the Institute of Cancer Research to work on the development of a novel ChIP assay to analyse histone modification of sister alleles, before moving to St. George's University to investigate the DNA damage response in Drosophila S2 cells. My current research focuses on uncovering the role and functions of protein ADP-ribosylation using fruit flies.
osamu.suyari [at] path.ox.ac.uk
+44 (0) 1865 285655
Kerryanne Crawford
Postdoctoral Researcher
I am fascinated with the use of transgenic models as an essential way to deepen our understanding of complex disease processes such as the development of cancer. During my PhD at The University of Liverpool I developed two novel strains of transgenic mice including the design, ES cell targeting and primary phenotyping. My primary role in the Ivan Ahel Lab is to incorporate in vivo research into the group’s core skills and techniques to complement in vitro studies with genetic models of our genes of interest (i.e. KO animals). This will enable us to elegantly and unequivocally determine the effect of gene loss in a whole living organism and to elucidate the in vivo role of the post-translational modification ADP-ribosylation.
kerryanne.crawford [at] path.ox.ac.uk
+44 (0) 1865 285655
Roberto Raggiaschi
Postdoctoral Researcher
After I obtained my MS in Biological Science from the University of Siena (Italy) with a work carried out at Leiden University (NL) sponsored by an Erasmus Scholarship and my PhD in Biotechnology working, partially in the Chiron Corporation laboratories in Siena and partially at the University of Siena, I had my first Post Doc at the University of Cambridge with a Marie Curie fellowship. Subsequently I had a position as head of Lab of Protein Sciences at Siena Biotech a biotechnology company in Siena. Once I moved to Oxford I arrived at the Sir William Dunn School of Pathology, initially in the Prof. Oreste Acuto's Lab and successively in 2021 I joined Prof. Ivan Ahel's lab where I supervise the investigation of the expression of ARH3 hydrolase in cancer ovarian tissues by IHC and express and purify proteins that are involved in the regulation of ADP ribosylation.
roberto.raggiaschi [at] path.ox.ac.uk
+44 (0) 1865 285655
Marion Schuller
Postdoctoral Researcher
Following my BSc and MSc in Pharmaceutical Sciences at the Ludwig Maximilian University, I obtained my DPhil in ‘Systems Approaches to Biomedical Science - Industrial Doctorate Centre’ at the University of Oxford under the supervision of Prof Stefan Knapp and Prof Benedikt Kessler in collaboration with Novartis. I investigated strategies to modify PARP14 function through macrodomain inhibition using a combination of biochemistry, structural biology and cell biology approaches. I joined the Ivan Ahel lab to pursue my interests in the development of inhibitors of ADP-ribosylation recognising modules and to study novel enzyme systems for the reversible ADP-ribosylation of DNA and their role in microbial pathogenicity.
marion.schuller [at] path.ox.ac.uk
+44 (0) 1865 285655
Chatrin
Postdoctoral Researcher
I first encountered the wonderful world of post-translational modification during my PhD research at Cancer Research UK Beatson Institute and University of Glasgow with Prof. Danny Huang. I worked with Deltex E3 ubiquitin ligases, which are capable of modifying ADP-ribose with ubiquitin. After finishing my PhD, I joined Ivan Ahel’s lab to further pursue my interest in understanding non-canonical ADP-ribosylation and their biological roles.
chatrin.chatrin [at] path.ox.ac.uk
+44 (0) 1865 285655
Andrii Gorelik
Postdoctoral researcher
I am a Sir Henry Wellcome Postdoctoral Fellow working on molecular mechanisms of cysteine ADP-ribosylation. I obtained my PhD from the University of Dundee where I worked on tool development to study site-specific protein O-GlcNAcylation with Prof. Daan van Aalten. Prior to joining Ivan's lab I was a postdoctoral research associate with Prof. Ed Tate at the Francis Crick Institute and Imperial College London working on N-myristoylation in MYC-deregulated cancers.
andrii.gorelik [at] path.ox.ac.uk
+44 (0) 1865 285655
Domagoj Baretic
Postdoctoral Researcher
During my first degree at Zagreb I began my lab work by measuring interactions between potential anti-cancer drug molecules and nucleic acids. However, my true passion for molecular mechanisms developed during my graduated studies in Roger Williams lab at the LMB in Cambridge where I was first introduced to phosphorylation and crucial roles of protein kinases involved in distinct signalling pathways such as sensing of amino acids and DNA damage response. Subsequently, the latter led me on to joining the group of Joe Yeeles, where we carried out work on the mechanisms of DNA replication stress by studying 3D architecture of a multiprotein molecular machine called DNA replisome. I have then joined the lab of Ivan Ahel to learn more about the fundamental biology of ADP-ribosylation and its multifaceted function.
domagoj.baretic [at] path.ox.ac.uk
+44 (0) 1865 285655
Undergraduate students
Bara Cihlova
Undergraduate student
I joined the Ahel Lab in my first year of undergraduate studies at the University of Oxford (MSci Biochemistry). Previously, in my spare time after school, I trained in biochemistry and worked on the characterisation of RNA-viral enzymes for antiviral development at IOCB, Prague. Experiments with viral polymerases spurred my interest in DNA-governing enzymes, particularly during DNA damage and repair. Thus, I joined the Ahel lab, which has allowed me to explore the emerging field of nucleic acid ADP-ribosylation by biochemical analyses.
bara.cihlova [at] univ.ox.ac.uk
+44 (0) 1865 285655
