Wenting GUO, post-doctoral researcher at the Stem Cell Institute Leuven (SCIL), KU Leuven University, is the laureate of the Junior Group Leader 2022 call of NeuroStra (on the thematics “Pain” and “Neurodegeneration”). She was selected among 30 candidates by two successive juries, a first pre-selective one composed of representatives of the NeuroStra research units, and a second one international, external to NeuroStra. She will join Luc Dupuis’ Inserm Unit 1118 Central and peripheral mechanisms of neurodegeneration, and will benefit from a 200 K€ starting-package from NeuroStra to begin building her own research team.

Project

Wenting GUO’s project aims at both understanding the pathogenesis and seeking for new treatment for neurodegenerative disorders, with a special focus on the ALS-FTD spectrum. She will use multi-dimensional approaches that build on sophisticated human-derived disease models, with special focus on axonal transport deficiency and neuron-muscle innervation as phenotype readout. She eventually intends to set up trustworthy genetic and phenotype large-scale screen to find new disease modifiers and therapeutic targets for ALS and FTD.

Selected bibliography

CRISPR/Cas9 screen in human iPSC-derived cortical neurons identifies NEK6 as a novel disease modifier of C9orf72 poly(PR) toxicity. Guo W, Wang H, Kumar Tharkeshwar A, Couthouis J, Braems E, Masrori P, Van Schoor E, Fan Y, Ahuja K, Moisse M, Jacquemyn M, Furtado Madeiro da Costa R, Gajjar M, Balusu S, Tricot T, Fumagalli L, Hersmus N, Janky R, Impens F, Vanden Berghe P, Ho R, Thal DR, Vandenberghe R, Hegde ML, Chandran S, De Strooper B, Daelemans D, Van Damme P, Van Den Bosch L, Verfaillie C. Alzheimers Dement. 2022.

The multifaceted role of kinases in amyotrophic lateral sclerosis: genetic, pathological and therapeutic implications. Guo W, Vandoorne T, Steyaert J, Staats KA, Van Den Bosch L. Brain. 2020.

Mutant FUS causes DNA ligation defects to inhibit oxidative damage repair in Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis.
Wang H, Guo W, Mitra J, Hegde PM, Vandoorne T, Eckelmann BJ, Mitra S, Tomkinson AE, Van Den Bosch L, Hegde ML. Nat Commun. 2018.

HDAC6 inhibition reverses axonal transport defects in motor neurons derived from FUS-ALS patients. Guo W, Naujock M, Fumagalli L, Vandoorne T, Baatsen P, Boon R, Ordovás L, Patel A, Welters M, Vanwelden T, Geens N, Tricot T, Benoy V, Steyaert J, Lefebvre-Omar C, Boesmans W, Jarpe M, Sterneckert J, Wegner F, Petri S, Bohl D, Vanden Berghe P, Robberecht W, Van Damme P, Verfaillie C, Van Den Bosch L. Nat Commun. 2017.