Gaizka Otaegi - Post-doctoral Fellow/ Basque Extraordinaire
Hola,
I'm Gaizka and I started working with Tao in March of 2007. I started my undergraduate education as a Biology major at the Basque Country University, in Bilbao of course, and I finished in Genetics iat Complutense University of Madrid, where I got my first science experience researching wheat´s genetics features. After university I decided to change my field, so for the next four years and a half I worked on development of neural stem cells of retina and olfactory bulb and their different pathways activated by IGF-I and PTEN. All this work was done in CIB institute in Madrid during my PhD, under the supervision of Professor Flora de Pablo. Now, as a post-doc, I am interested in the study of different mechanisms that control cortex or spinal cord development. Our work shows that several microRNAs, a non coding class of RNA, are essential for the development of some areas and cell types of the murine cortex, and for the development of different classes of motor neurons in chickens. Apart from science I enjoy funny cultural miscommunications of the labmates. I also like to enjoy this crazy city during the day, and of course at night. Travelling, reading and learning about new cultures and people are things that I like.
Publications:
Otaegi, G., de
Pablo, F., Vicario-Abejo, C., & de la Rosa, J. (2007). Retinal and olfactory
bulb precursor cells show distinct responses to FGF-2 and laminin.
Cell biology international, 31, 752-58 [here]
Otaegi, G., Yusta-Boyo, M.J.,
Vergano-Vera, E., Mendez-Gomez, H.R., Carrera, A.C., Abada, J.L., Gonzalez, M.,
de la Rosa, E.J., Vicario-Abejon, C., & de Pablo, F. (2006). Modulation of
the PI 3-kinase-Akt signalling pathway by IGF-1 and PTEN regulates the
differentiation of neural stem/precursor cells. Journal of Cell
Science, 119, 2739-48
[here]
Contact info:
gao2003 at med.cornell.edu