Introduction to Epigenetics

Biology of Chromatin.- Chromatin Dynamics.- Cellular Memory.- Dosage Compensation Systems.- Genomic Imprinting.- RNA-based Mechanisms of Gene Silencing.- Regeneration and Reprogramming.- Epigenetics and Cancer.- Epigenetics and Metabolism.

Renato Paro received his Ph.D. at the Biozentrum of the University of Basel. After postdoctoral stays at the University of Edinburgh and Stanford University, he continued his career at the Center for Molecular Biology of the University of Heidelberg (ZMBH) in Germany. In 2000 became Professor at the Faculty of Medicine and Faculty of Biosciences of the University of Heidelberg and acting director of the ZMBH. In 2006 he was appointed founding chair of the new Department of Biosystems Science and Engineering (D-BSSE) of the ETH Zurich in Basel and Professor of Biosystems at the University of Basel. The major research areas of his laboratory focused on mechanisms of epigenetic gene control and cellular signaling. He is now Emeritus Professor.Ueli Grossniklaus is Professor of Plant Developmental Genetics and Director of the Department of Plant and Microbial Biology of the University of Zurich. Grossniklaus earned his PhD working on Drosophila development under the mentorship of Walter J. Gehring at the University of Basel. Extending concepts and experimental approaches from Drosophila to plants, he has led thriving research groups investigating the molecular basis of plant reproduction, first at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory in the U.S.A. and, since 2000, at the University of Zurich in Switzerland. Grossniklaus' group made seminal contribution to understanding the epigenetic mechanisms that control of seed development, in particular gene regulation by Polycomb-group proteins and genomic imprinting.