Genetics

I'm a neuroscientist who works on profoundly neurodegenerative inherited diseases that mostly affect children and young adults. These are lysosomal storage disorders, due to failed lysosomal function. My lab works to understand these diseases better. which brain regions and cell types are affected. We then use this information to better target therapies (gene therapy and enzyme replacement) to the places where they can be most effective. This work has taken us from mice to large animal models and from the brain to the bowel.

Research keywords: neurodegeneration; gene therapy; genetics

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The Meers Lab studies how transcription factors interact with and overcome barriers presented by chromatin landscapes to specify developmental and cellular reprogramming outcomes. To do so, we develop cutting-edge epigenomics techniques to map transcription factor binding and chromatin structure in the same context at ultra-high resolution and in single cells. We then marshal our advanced technological approaches and the fundamental molecular insights we uncover to study how transcription factor-chromatin interactions go awry and contribute to pathogenesis in diseases such as cancer. These three areas, Biology, Technology, and Disease, drive a cycle of discovery that fuels our research.

Research keywords: Chromatin; Genomics; Single cell

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