Tapahtumakalenteri
Dissertation: Suneeta Narumanchi
Opponent: Associate Professor Dimitris Beis, University Of Ioannina
MINERVA SEMINAR Associate Professor DIMITRIS BEIS
Associate Professor DIMITRIS BEIS
University
of Ioannina
Greece
***
Dr. Beis did his PhD in Utrecht, where he studied the role of plant hormone auxin and the PLETHORA family of transcription factors. In 2002, he moved to UCSF as a post-doc in the lab of Didier Stainier and worked with zebrafish on cardiac valve development. He was the first to describe this process at cellular resolution using confocal microscopy.
Dr. Beis
moved back to Greece in 2005 and introduced zebrafish biomedical research in
Greece. He is a founding member of the European Zebrafish Society. He
collaborates with Greek research teams to train people using zebrafish as an
experimental model system for bioactive compound screening, ecotoxicological
studies, and gene function studies.
Dr. Beis’ research focuses on cardiovascular disease and angiogenesis.
His group has identified the significance of intracardiac flow dynamics during
heart development for proper cardiac valve development. Recently, Dr. Beis
expanded his research to study the mechanisms of cardiovascular regeneration.
He developed the first inducible system to genetically ablate valve cells and
demonstrated that zebrafish can regenerate their cardiac valves, identifying
Notch and Tgfβ signaling pathways as critical regulators of this process.
In parallel, Dr. Beis has set up high-throughput chemical screens using
zebrafish embryos for drug repurposing and identifying novel bioactive
compounds. His lab routinely screens for angiogenesis inhibition, melanogenesis
inhibition, wound healing, cardiac function, and toxicity and uses human cancer
cell xenotransplantation in zebrafish.
Selected publications:
Giardoglou P, Deloukas P, Dedoussis G, Beis D. (2023) Cfdp1 Is
Essential for Cardiac Development and Function. Cells. 3;12(15):1994.
doi: 10.3390/cells12151994.
Katraki-Pavlou S, Kastana P, Bousis D, Ntenekou D, Varela A, Davos CH, Nikou S,
Papadaki E, Tsigkas G, Athanasiadis E, Herradon G, Mikelis CM, Beis
D*, Papadimitriou E. * (2022) Protein tyrosine phosphatase
receptor-ζ1 deletion triggers defective heart morphogenesis in mice and
zebrafish. Am J Physiol Heart Circ Physiol. 322(1):H8-H24. doi:
10.1152/ajpheart.00400.2021.
Beis D. (2021) Zebrafish research in Greece: swimming against the current. Int
J Dev Biol. Sep 20. doi: 10.1387/ijdb.210129db. Epub ahead of print. PMID:
34549794.
Katsouda, A.; Peleli, M.; Asimakopoulou, A.; Papapetropoulos, A.; Beis, D.
(2020) Generation and Characterization of a CRISPR/Cas9 -Induced 3-mst
Deficient Zebrafish. Biomolecules; 10, 317.
Kefalos P, Agalou A, Kawakami K and Beis D (2019) Reactivation of
Notch signaling is required for cardiac valve regeneration Sci Rep 9, 16059
(2019) doi:10.1038/s41598-019-52558-y
Dissertation: Maria Pekkola
Opponent: docent Eeva Ekholm, University of Turku
Dissertation: Michelle Renlund-Vikström
Opponent: Associate Professor Nicole Sekarski-Hunkeler, Lausanne University Hospital
Dissertation: Anna Mäkinen
Opponent: professor Michael Curtis, King's College London