PhD defence: The Role of Actin Regulators on DNA Damage Respons

Xiubin He

Actin polymerization has been revealed to be involved in DNA repair pathways and promote homologous recombination (HR) repair in the nucleus.

In this thesis, I identified several actin regulators whose knock-out could affect the efficiency of homology-directed repair and the dynamic γH2AX response after double-strand breaks.

Particularly, I discovered a previously unrecognized role of RHOA, a small RHO GTPase, in the DNA damage response pathway particularly in HR repair which is not fully dependent on actin polymerization pathway.

The findings also support that RHOA might serve as a prognostic biomarker for chemotherapeutic treatment in cancer.

Assessment Committee

Professor Janine Terra Erler (chair), Biotech Research and Innovation Centre (BRIC), University of Copenhagen.

Dr Apolinar Maya-Mendoza, Danish Cancer Institute.

Professor Grant Simon Stewart, University of Birmingham.

Supervisors

Professor Cord Herbert Brakebusch

Professor Hans H. Wandall

Graduate Programme

Molecular Mechanisms of Disease

Place

Building: Panum, Room: Aud. 29.01.32, Blegdamsvej 3B, 2200 Copenhagen

Copy of thesis

Email address to gain access to the thesis: xiubin.he@bric.ku.dk.

You will either receive a copy of the thesis or be informed where you can read a physical copy.

Recipients of copies of the thesis are not allowed to share or distribute it due to copyright compliance.