SwitchHD

	Education and work experience
	03/2015 – present	Experienced researcher at QPS Austria, Austria Research and Development, Animal Facility Unit
	04/2009 – 02/2015	Researcher and Ph.D. candidate at the University of Tuebingen, Germany Institute of Medical Genetics and Applied Genomics, Huntington Disease Group
	10/2004 – 03/2009	Research assistant and Diploma student at the University of Marburg, Germany. Department of Animal Physiology
	10/2001 – 09/2004	Diploma student at the University of Frankfurt, Germany. Department of Biology
	Work to be performed within SwitchHD:
	1.	Metabolic dysfunction in BACHD rats BACHD rats show metabolic abnormalities already at the early age of 1 month. Most prominently, the rats display a reduced body size and obesity (Jansson & Clemens et al., 2014). Pilot studies suggest that this is the result of reduced growth hormone availability and impaired lipid utilization (Clemens & Yu-Taeger et al., unpublished). There are further indications that the altered body constitution of BACHD rats might confound outcomes of behavioral studies working with food reward, unless the food deprivation regime is adapted (Jansson & Clemens et al., 2014). The aim is to validate these results by investigating feeding behavior and performing serum and histological brain analyses.
	2.	Cognitive dysfunction in BACHD rats BACHD rats show reversal learning deficits in several cognitive tasks (Abada et al., 2013; Clemens & Weber et al., in revision; Jansson et al., unpublished). It is of interest to evaluate, if the deficits originate from striatal or hippocampal disturbances by the use several maze setups that differentially affect these two brain regions.
	3.	Inactivation of mutant huntingtin in different primary BACHD rat neurons The major aim of SwitchHD is the inactivation of mutant huntingtin in different areas of the brain to investigate their contribution to the disease pathogenesis. Primary striatal, cortical and hypothalamic neurons are screened for mutant huntingtin-related disruption of molecular pathways of cell energy metabolism, survival and death by means of gene silencing.

	Education and Work Experience
	02/2016 - present	Experienced researcher at QPS Austria, Austria Research and Development, Animal Facility Unit
	03/2012 - 01/2016	Researcher and Ph.D. candidate at the University of Tuebingen, Germany Institute of Medical Genetics and Applied Genomics
	10/2011 - 02/2012	Research assistant at the University of Tuebingen, Center for Plant Molecular Biology
	10/2006 - 09/2011	Diploma student ath the University of Hohenheim, Germany Department of Biology
	SWITCH-HD
	Inactivation of mutant huntingtin in different primary BACHD rat neurons. The major aim of SwitchHD is the inactivation of mutant huntingtin in different areas of the brain to investigate their contribution to the disease pathogenesis. Primary striatal, cortical and hypothalamic neurons are screened for mutant huntingtin-related disruption of molecular pathways of cell energy metabolism, survival and death by means of gene silencing.

Arianna Novati is a biologist with background in in the fields of animal physiology and behavioral neuroscience. Currently she is a postdoctoral fellow in the Switch HD project, transferred from QPS Austria to the University of Tuebingen (EKUT). Her work within the project aims to contribute to the behavioral characterization of the BACHD rat model and will focus on depressive like behavior, maternal care and sexual behavior. Her research will include also analyses of molecular markers related to behavioral phenotypes as well as brain epigenetic changes associated to environmental manipulations in BACHD rats. Her secondment is meant to convey experience on test procedures for cognitive deficits in rats from QPS to EKUT and transfer knowledge on psychiatric like symptoms in BACHD rats back to QPS.

	Education
	2003 – 2006	Bachelor of Science (Food and Nutritional Science) University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong
	2006 – 2010	Doctor of Philosophy (Molecular Biology) University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong
	Working experience
	2011 – 2012	Postdoctoral Fellow (Regenerative medicine) National Institute for Materials Science (NIMS), Japan
	2012 – 2014	Postdoctoral Research Associate (Neurodegeneration and gene therapy) University of Sheffield, United Kingdom
	2014 – 2015	Postdoctoral Fellow (Neuroimaging) Max Planck Institute for Biological Cybernetics, Germany
	2015.02 – Present	Postdoctoral Fellow (Neurodegeneration) University of Tuebingen, Germany
	SWITCH-HD
	Huntington disease is an autosomal dominantly inherited neurodegenerative disorder with no effective treatment at present. In this project, the effects of down-regulating the mutant huntingtin on rescuing the HD symptoms in the transgenic BACHD model will be investigated using a gene therapy approach coupled to neuroimaging, neuropathological and behavioural analyses. I will be delivering a viral-based vector for inactivating mutant huntingtin in the hypothalamus and characterize the treated animals by behavioural tests, neuroimaging, biomarkers in blood and cerebrospinal fluid, and neuropathological analyses.

	Working Experience
	December 2014- present	Postdoctocroral Researcher, QPS Austria
	2010 –2014	PhD (partly funded by Marie Curie fellowship) Department of Clinical Neuroscience, Karolinska Institute, Stockholm, Sweden
	2005 - 2008	Research assistant Institute for Neurophysiology and Pathophysiology, University Medical Centre Hamburg - Eppendorf, Hamburg, Germany
	Education
	2003 - 2005	MSc Neuroscience Department of Neurobiology and Biophysics, Faculty of Biology, University of Bucharest (Romania) Institute for Neurophysiology and Pathophysiology, University Medical Centre Hamburg - Eppendorf, Hamburg, Germany Department of Neurobiology and Biophysics, Faculty of Biology, University of Bucharest (Romania)
	1999 - 2003	BSc Biology Department of Biology, Faculty of Biology, University of Bucharest (Romania)
	Work to be performed within SwitchHD:
	1.	in vivo inactivation of mutant huntingtin (mHTT) in striatum and hypothalamus of BACHD rats by intrathecal administration of virus vector construct;
	2.	further characterize the cognitive deficits and psychiatric symptoms of BACHD rats in different mazes setups;
	3.	longitudinal CSF sampling, biochemical measurements in the CSF, blood and brain tissue;
	4.	evaluating the effects of selectively inactivation of mHTT in striatum.

	Work Experience
	Jan.2014-present	Post-Doc in the Huntington Disease Research Group at the Institute of Medical Genetics and Applied Genomics, University of Tuebingen Research topic: Neuropathogenesis of HD and Dystonia
	Jul.2013-Dec.2013	Post-Doc at at QPS Austria GmbH Research topic: Silencing transgene mutant huntingtin in BACHD rats using viral transduction to deliver recombinase Cre
	Nov.2007-Jun.2013	Ph.D. candidate in the Huntington Disease Research Group at the Institute of Medical Genetics and Applied Genomics, University of Tuebingen Research topic: Generation and Characterization of BACHD transgene rats expressing full-length human mutant huntingtin
	Sep.2006-Oct.2007	Undergraduate student at Hertie-Institute for Clinical Brain Research, University of Tuebingen Research topic: Aging’s effect on neurodegeneration processes in Alzheimer disease
	Works performed for SWITCH-HD
	1.	Transferring knowledge to QPS regarding genotyping and handling of BACHD rats
	2.	Evaluation of transduction efficacy in vitro and in vivo in BACHD rats. For this work, Libo Yu-Taeger performed viral transduction using primary cortical neurons and intrastriatal injection in BACHD rats. Cre-mediated excision of floxed DNA sequence in the transgene mutant huntingtin (mHTT) was confirmed in vitro and in vivo. The transduction efficiency was investigated showing approximately 40% transduced cells in vitro and 5% in vivo. The expressions of mHTT on the RAN and protein levels were compared between viral transduced cells/striatum and the controls. Reduced mHTT expression was found in the viral transduced primary cortical neurons, while there was no difference of mHTT expression was detected in the viral injected striatum due to very low transduction efficiency in vivo

Fellows:

Education and work experience

Work to be performed within SwitchHD:

Education and Work Experience

SWITCH-HD

Education

Working experience

SWITCH-HD

Working Experience

Education

Work to be performed within SwitchHD:

Work Experience

Works performed for SWITCH-HD

SwitchHD is funded from the European Community’s Seventh Framework Programme FP7/2012 under grant agreement No. 324495