Research focus

Our research aims to understand how RNA modifications and the enzymes that install them control post-transcriptional gene expression in health and disease. RNA modifications – the epitranscriptome – expand the functional information encoded in the four canonical RNA bases and thereby shape RNA function. Although many RNA modifications and their associated enzymes have been characterized, we also need to understand how cells control RNA modifying enzyme activity across different cellular states and how this dynamic regulation reshapes the epitranscriptome. The importance of RNA modifying enzymes is underscored by the fact that their dysregulation contributes to cellular stress and links to a wide range of diseases, including neurodegeneration and cancer.

A central focus of our group is on uncovering the mechanistic principles that determine RNA-modifying enzyme activity. We study how substrate specificity, catalysis, and other regulatory interactions are controlled in eukaryotic cells. We also investigate how stress or disease dynamically alter these properties and, in turn, affects RNA modification patterns and gene expression. In the spirit of „what we cannot build, we cannot truly understand“, we further develop synthetic biology-inspired strategies to repurpose RNA-modifying enzymes as programmable tools. These tools allow us to install RNA modifications and thereby record and reprogram RNA function in living cells. To this end, we combine enzymology and synthetic biology with next-generation sequencing based epitranscriptomics. Our overall goal is to obtain molecular insights into the regulation of RNA modifying enzymes and use this knowledge to develop new tools for RNA biology.

Current topics

Epitranscriptomic control of gene expression
RNA modifications and RNA-modifying enzymes
Programmable tools for installing RNA modifications