Romano Regazzi group

Presentation

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Diabetes mellitus is a very common metabolic disorder affecting more than 400 million people worldwide. It manifests when pancreatic β-cells release insufficient insulin to cover the organism’s needs and to maintain blood glucose homeostasis. Insulin secretion from β-cells plays an essential role in the control of blood glucose levels. Dysfunction and failure of β-cells are linked to alterations in gene expression caused by prolonged exposure of the insulin-secreting cells to elevated concentrations of glucose, fatty acids or inflammatory mediators. The goal of the studies carried out in our group is to assess the role of newly discovered forms of non-coding RNAs, including microRNAs, long non-coding RNAs and circular RNAs in the control of β-cell functions and in the development of different forms of diabetes mellitus.

Research

Identification of transcriptomic changes leading to β-cell dysfunction

We use global transcriptomic approaches such as microarray analysis and high throughput RNA-sequencing to identify relevant non-coding RNAs that are differentially expressed in pancreatic islets under specific physiological or pathological conditions. In particular, we explore changes occurring during pregnancy, obesity, aging and diabetes development. We then evaluate the role of the identified non-coding RNAs in insulin secretion, proliferation and apoptosis by modulating their levels in pancreatic β-cells.

Members

Romano Regazzi, Full Professor, Director of the DBS

Romano Regazzi received a PhD in Biochemistry from the University of Basel, Switzerland in 1987. After a postdoctoral fellowship at the University of Geneva in the laboratory of Prof. Claes Wollheim, he obtained an assistant professor position at the University of Lausanne, Switzerland. In 2001, he was promoted associate professor and few years later full professor at the same University. Besides his research activities, Prof. Regazzi is also vice-director of the Medical School of the University of Lausanne.

Bilal Bayazit, PhD student

Bilal pursued his BSc Degree in Molecular and Cellular Biology at the University of Glasgow, UK and his MSc Degree in Molecular Biology at Gothenburg University, Sweden. He completed his MSc project, focusing on kinase activity during meiosis in mice. He joined the Regazzi Lab as a PhD student in 2017 and is studying the lncRNAs in aging.

Flora Brozzi, Postdoc

Flora obtained her Ph.D. in Experimental Biology and Medicine from the University of Perugia in Italy. After a few years as postdoctoral fellow at the UWE in Bristol (UK) and at the ULB Center for Diabetes Research in Brussels, she joined Pr. Regazzi’s laboratory in 2018. She studies the role of non-coding RNAs in the regulation of pancreatic beta cell function during the development of diabetes.

Cristina Cosentino, Postdoc

Cristina obtained her Ph.D in Molecular and Translational Medicine in 2015 at the University of Milan. She completed a first postdoctoral fellowship at the ULB Center for Diabetes Research in Brussels, contributing to the identification of novel pathogenic mechanisms of diabetes based on transfer RNA (tRNA) hypomodification and fragmentation. She joined Prof. Regazzi’s lab in 2019. She is investigating the role of small non-coding RNAs in type 1 and type 2 diabetes and in the cross-talk between cells during diabetes pathogenesis.

Claudiane Guay, Staff Scientist

Research associate Claudiane holds a PhD in Molecular Biology from Montreal University, Canada. She joined the Regazzi lab in 2009 as a postdoctoral fellow to study the implication of microRNAs in the regulation of pancreatic beta-cell function. She is now a research associate and continues to investigate the role of miRNAs in the development of Type 1 and Type 2 diabetes.

Cécile Jacovetti, Postdoc

Cécile obtained her Ph.D. in Molecular and Cellular Biology from the University of Lausanne. After a few years as a postdoctoral fellow at Stanford University and at the University of California, San Francisco, she joined Pr. Regazzi’s laboratory in 2018. She studies the role of non-coding RNAs in pancreatic beta-cell function.

Véronique Menoud, Lab technician

Véronique studied at the Laboratory School in Lausanne, Switzerland. After a few years in an Immunology laboratory at CHUV, Lausanne, she joined the group of R. Regazzi in 1997.
She has participated in several projects concerning the mechanisms regulating the function of pancreatic beta-cells. She now works on the role of miRNAs in development of Type 1 and Type 2 diabetes.