GSCN 2023 Young Investigator Award

Dr Meike Hohwieler from Ulm University Hospital receives the GSCN 2023 Young Investigator Award from the German Stem Cell Network (GSCN). The stem cell biologist conducts research on the early development of pancreatic diseases.
In her research at the Institute of Molecular Oncology and Stem Cell Biology at Ulm University Hospital, Meike Hohwieler develops pancreatic organoids from pluripotent stem cells. These models serve to deepen the still largely unknown understanding of the developmental biological processes of both the healthy human pancreas and its diseases. Organoids reproduce the developmental steps of human cells much more adequate than mouse models and can thus also partially replace animal experiments. For this purpose, Hohwieler developed a kind of cell chip which an read the early developmental stages of the cells and which enables a systematic development of the pancreatic organoids. Her findings pave the way for innovative possibilities in the early detection of pancreatic carcinomas as well as diabetes. Pancreatic cancer is a cancer that is often detected very late, is very heterogeneous and has an exceedingly poor prognosis: Five years after the diagnosis, only twelve percent of patients are still alive.

Meike Hohwieler completed her Master studies in Molecular Biotechnology at the Technical University of Munich and joined the lab of Alexander Kleger at the Ulm University hospital in 2012. Here, she participated in the International PhD program in Molecular Medicine of Ulm University and obtained the doctoral degree with her work on “Human Pluripotent Stem Cell-​derived Pancreatic Organoids to Study Cystic Fibrosis in a Dish”.

Meike Hohwieler 

GSCN 2023 Publication of the Year
Ruzhica Bogeska, ... Michael D. Milsom from Division of Experimental Hematology, German Cancer Research Center (DKFZ) & HI-STEM, receive the GSCN 2023 Publication of the Year Award for the publication “Inflammatory exposure drives long-lived impairment of hematopoietic stem cell self-renewal activity and accelerated aging” in the journal Cell Stem Cell, Aug. 2022.
The manuscript examines the long-term consequences of inflammation and infection challenge on hematopoietic stem cells, leading to the surprising observation that these stem cells never functionally recover from such challenges. This data supported a model where the inhibitory effect of such challenges can accumulate during an individual’s lifetime, even if the exposure to such agonists is separated by weeks, months or even years. In support of this hypothesis, mice exposed to inflammatory challenge in early to mid-life demonstrated an accelerated hematologic aging phenotype and developed features of normal human aged hematopoiesis that are not routinely observed in laboratory mice.
At the GSCN Conference 2023 in Ulm, Ruzhica Bogeska will give the award lecture on 14 September.

Publication: 
Inflammatory exposure drives long-lived impairment of hematopoietic stem cell self-renewal activity and accelerated aging in the journal Cell Stem Cell, Aug. 2022

"GSCN 2021 Young Investigator Award"

Prof. Dr. Elvira Mass receives the "GSCN 2021 Young Investigator Award" for her outstanding research in the field of the developmental significance of macrophages as cells of the innate immune system. Mass showed that macrophages, so-called big eaters, are long-lived and are an integral part of organogenesis. When mutated, they can initiate maldevelopments, e.g., in the brain, and play a decisive role in later diseases. Thus, Mass is changing the understanding of macrophages in their role in embryonic organ development and their influence on disease ontogeny and progression.

Elvira Mass (35) studied biology at the University of Bonn and earned her doctorate at the Life and Medical Sciences Institute (LIMES). In 2014, she joined Frederic Geissmann's lab at King's College in London and followed him a few months later to Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in New York. From there, she returned to the LIMES Institute at the University of Bonn in 2017 as a group leader. In 2019, she became a professor for "Integrated Immunology" at the University of Erlangen-Nürnberg. In 2020, she moved to a professorship at the LIMES Institute. Mass has received several awards, including the Heinz Maier Leibnitz Prize in 2020 and the Paul Ehrlich and Ludwig Darmstaedter Young Investigator Award in 2021.

Elvira Mass 

Prof. Dr. Katja Schenke-Layland receives the "GSCN 2021 Hilde Mangold Award" for her significant research on the translation of findings from early human development into applications for regenerative medicine with a special focus on the extracellular matrix. Her career as a scientist and science manager shows a path of success that could be exemplary and inspiring for young women researchers: After studying biology and completing her doctorate in Jena, Katja Schenke-Layland moved to the USA, first as a postdoc and later as an assistant professor in Los Angeles, for in-depth research on cardiovascular tissue. From 2010, she took on various leadership positions in Germany at the Fraunhofer Institute for Interfacial Engineering and Biotechnology in Stuttgart, while also being an Associate Professor at UCLA in Los Angeles and, from 2011, Professor of Medical Engineering and Regenerative Medicine at the Medical Faculty of the Eberhard Karls University in Tübingen. Since 2018, she has been the Director at the NMI Natural and Medical Sciences Institute in Reutlingen.

"GSCN 2021 Publication of the Year"

Katharina Scheibner and Heiko Lickert receive the "GSCN 2021 Publication of the Year Award" together with Ingo Burtscher and Silvia Schirge for their joint publication "Epithelial cell plasticity drives endoderm formation during gastrulation", published 2021 in Nature Cell Biology. The scientists from the Institute of Diabetes and Regeneration Research at Helmholtz Zentrum München gained new insights into the formation of the endoderm cotyledon during gastrulation, the first phase of embryonic development. The researchers show that the formation of the endoderm cotyledon is regulated by the plasticity of the epithelial cells. This allows the cells to leave the epithelium and migrate away. This is important not only to understand how a fertilized egg becomes a whole organism, but especially to understand how hereditary diseases develop. This understanding could help improve cell replacement therapies. (Scheibner, Schirge, Burtscher et al., 2021: Epithelial cell plasticity drives endoderm formation during gastrulation. Nature Cell Biology, DOI: 10.1038/s41556-021-00694-x)

Publication: Scheibner, Schirge, Burtscher et al., 2021: Epithelial cell plasticity drives endoderm formation during gastrulation. Nature Cell Biology, DOI: 10.1038/s41556-021-00694-x

Katharina Scheibner

Silvia Schirge

Heiko Lickert

Ingo Burtscher