Project Details
Projekt
The role of miRNAs and long-noncoding (lnc) RNAs in brown adipose tissue (BAT) development.
Applicant
Dr. Marko Knoll
Subject Area
Developmental Biology
Term
from 2013 to 2016
Project identifier
Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 235661898
There are two principal types of fat tissue in mammals. Whereas white adipose tissue (WAT) is specialized to store chemical energy in form of triglycerides, brown adipose tissue is specialized to generate heat and consume energy as a defense against cold and obesity. Brown fat tissue exists in healthy adults but was shown to be reduced in obese adults. Thus increasing BAT mass is an attractive and reasonable goal of this study. A lot is known of how proteins and transcription factors influence the development of BAT but only little is known how small non-coding RNAs influence their development. Therefore I will analyze how non-coding RNAs contribute to the development of brown fat tissue. Two miRNAs, miR-193b-365 and miR-203 were previously identified to be essential for brown fat differentiation. I aim to generate conditional knock out mice of these two miRNAs and characterize the effects of miRNA deletion on BAT development, metabolic homeostasis and thermogenesis. Further, seven BAT specific lncRNAs were identified by an RNA seq screen in collaboration with the Broad Institute. I will test the hypothesis that these BAT specific lncRNAs are essential for BAT development and will determine their molecular mechanism.
DFG Programme
Research Fellowships
International Connection
USA
