KEYWORDS
viruses
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translational control
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epitrasncriptome
Juana Díez studied biology and obtained her PhD from the University Autónoma of Madrid, Spain (PhD prize). For her post-doc she moved to the Institute of Virology (Madison, USA) where she carried the first genome-wide identification of host factors restricting viral replication under the supervision of Dr. Paul Ahlquist. In 2001 she obtained a professorship at the Department of Experimental and Health Sciences at the University Pompeu Fabra (Barcelona, Spain) where since then she leads the Molecular Virology group and coordinates the Microbiology teaching Unit. She is a full professor from 2017. Currently her lab is financed by Spanish and European grants. She received in 2016 the ICREA Academia award for excellence in research and in 2019 the Technology Transfer award.
The main focus of her group is to decipher key molecular interactions of emerging viruses with their host cells and to use this knowledge to develop broad-spectrum antivirals. Her group combines transcriptome-wide translational analyses and cellular and molecular biology approaches to elucidate the complex and dynamic interactions that these viruses establish in human and mosquito cells to expand.
5 selcted publications last 5 years
1. Blasco-Moreno B, de Campos-Mata L, Böttcher R, García-Martínez J, Jungfleisch J, Nedialkova DD, Chattopadhyay S, Gas ME, Oliva B, Pérez-Ortín JE, Leidel SA, Choder M, Díez J. (2019). The exonuclease Xrn1 activates transcription and translation of mRNAs encoding membrane proteins. Nature Communications, Mar 21;10(1):1298. IF: 12,35 ; Q1
2. Doñate-Macián P, Jungfleisch J, Pérez-Vilaró G, Rubio-Moscardo F, Perálvarez-Marín A, Diez J., Valverde MA. (2018). The TRPV4 channel links calcium influx to DDX3X activity and viral infectivity. Nature Communications, Jun 13;9(1):2307. IF: 12,35 ; Q1
· This work was done in close collaboration with Dr. Valverde. Two members of my laboratory (Jungfleisch J. and Pérez-Vilaró G) participated in this collaboration.
3. Jungfleisch J, Nedialkova DD, Dotu I, Sloan KE, Martinez-Bosch N, Brüning L, Raineri E, Navarro P, Bohnsack MT, Leidel SA, Diez J. (2017). A novel translational control mechanism involving RNA structures within coding sequences. Genome Research 27(1): 95-106. IF: 11,9; Q1
· Featured in Research Highlights section of Nature Reviews Molecular and Cellular Biology Vol18, 72, 2017.
4. Koutsoudakis G, Romero-Brey I, Berger C, Pérez-Vilaró G, Perin PM, Vondran FW, Kalesse M, Harmrolfs K, Müller R, Martinez JP, Pietschmann T, Bartenschlager R, Brönstrup M, Meyerhans A, Díez J. (2015). Soraphen A: a broad-spectrum antiviral natural product with potent anti-hepatitis C virus activity. Journal of Hepatology, 63(4):813-821. IF: 12,4 ; Q1
5. Pérez-Vilaró G, Fernández-Carrillo C, Mensa L, Miquel R, Sanjuan X, Forns X, Pérez-del-Pulgar S, Díez J. (2015) Hepatitis C virus infection inhibits P-body granule formation in human livers. Journal of Hepatology, 62(4):785-790. IF: 12,4 ; Q1
· Editorial article focused on our results in Going full circle: validations of P-body dispersion in hepatitis C virus-infected patients Journal of Hepatology, 2015 Apr;62(4):756-8.
