VAN OBBERGHEN-SCHILLING , Ellen

International audience

Integrin-linked kinase (ILK) represents a key component of integrin signaling complexes that functions in concert with multiple binding partners to transmit cues from the extracellular matrix environment to the actin cytoskeleton. Both gain- and loss-of-function approaches to study ILK have confirmed the essential role of this protein in...

Extracellular matrix (ECM) receptors of the integrin family initiate changes in cell shape and motility by recruiting signaling components that coordinate these events. Integrin-linked kinase (ILK) is one such partner of beta1 integrins that participates in dynamic rearrangement of cell-matrix adhesions and cell spreading by mechanisms that are...

Fibronectin (FN) fibrillogenesis is an essential biological process mediated by alpha5beta1 integrin and cellular contractile forces. Assembly of a FN matrix by activated endothelial cells occurs during angiogenic blood vessel remodeling and signaling components that control this event represent attractive therapeutic targets. Here we examined...

Total internal reflection fluorescence microscopy (TIRF) produces 2D images of the fluorescent activity integrated over a very thin layer adjacent to the glass coverslip. By varying the illumination angle (multi-angle TIRF), a stack of 2D images is acquired from which it is possible to estimate the axial position of the observed biological...

Cellular fibronectin (FN) and tenascin-C (TNC) are prominent development-and disease-associated matrix components with pro-and anti-adhesive activity, respectively. Whereas both are present in the tumour vasculature, their functional interplay on vascular endothelial cells remains unclear. We have previously shown that basally-oriented...

The extracellular matrix (ECM) is a fundamental component of the tissue of multicellular organisms that is comprised of an intricate network of multidomain proteins and associated factors, collectively known as the matrisome. The ECM creates a biophysical environment that regulates essential cellular processes such as adhesion, proliferation...

Graph matching for shape comparison or network analysis is a challenging issue in machine learning and computer vision. Gener-ally, this problem is formulated as an assignment task, where we seek the optimal matching between the vertices that minimizes the differencebetween the graphs. We compare a standard approach to perform graph matching,...

The protein kinase Akt, also known as Protein Kinase B, has been implicated in the survival of several cell types challenged with various apoptotic stimuli. In CCL39 lung fibroblasts, apoptosis is induced by anchorage and mitogen removal. Mitogen-induced activation of Akt is highly anchorage dependent in these cells and removal of adhesion is...

Integrins play a key role in regulating endothelial cell survival, migration and differentiated function during angiogenic blood-vessel remodeling. Integrin-linked kinase (ILK) is a multidomain protein that interacts with the cytoplasmic tail of integrin beta subunits and is thought to participate in integrin-mediated signal transduction. We...

Normal tissue homeostasis and architecture restrain tumor growth. Thus, for a tumor to develop and spread, malignant cells must overcome growth-repressive inputs from surrounding tissue and escape immune surveillance mechanisms that curb cancer progression. This is achieved by promoting the conversion of a physiological microenvironment to a...

Endothelial cell interactions with their extracellular matrix are essential for vascular homeostasis and expansion. Large-scale proteomic analyses aimed at identifying components of integrin adhesion complexes have revealed the presence of several RNA binding proteins (RBPs) of which the functions at these sites remain poorly understood. Here,...

Due to the complex architectural diversity of biological networks, there is an increasing need to complement statistical analyses with a qualitative and local description of their spatial properties. One such network is the extracellular matrix (ECM), a biological scaffold for which changes in its spatial organization significantly impact...

This communication presents a pipeline for Multi-Angle TIRF calibration from the measurement of the incident angle to the model validation. This problem is of major importance when dealing with 3D reconstruction methods from a set of MA-TIRF acquisitions since the reconstruction accuracy highly depends on the agreement between the theoretical...

In addition to soluble factors, the extracellular matrix (ECM) also plays a vital role in normal vasculogenesis and in the pathological angiogenesis of many disease states. Here we will review what is known about the role of the ECM molecules fibronectin and tenascin-C in the vasculature and highlight a potential collaborative interplay between...

High resolution imaging of molecules at the cell-substrate interface is required for understanding key biological processes. Here we propose a complete pipeline for multi-angle total internal reflection fluorescence microscopy (MA-TIRF) going from instrument design and calibration procedures to numerical reconstruction. Our custom setup is...

Cellular fibronectin (cFN) variants harboring extra FN type 3 repeats, namely extra domains B and A, are major constituents of the extracellular matrix around newly forming blood vessels during development and angiogenesis. Their expression is induced by angiogenic stimuli and their assembly into fibrillar arrays is driven by cell-generated...

Characterising the tumour extracellular matrix (ECM) holds promise for identifying predictive biomarkers, particularly in assessing patient response to immunotherapy. While the cellular components of the tumour microenvironment have been extensively characterised, the non-cellular elements of this ecosystem remain underexplored. In this study,...

Integrin-linked kinase (ILK) and cytoplasmic adaptors of the PINCH and parvin families form a ternary complex, termed IPP, that localizes to integrin adhesions. We show here that deletion of the genes encoding ILK or PINCH1 similarly blocks maturation of focal adhesions to tensin-rich and phosphotyrosine-poor fibrillar adhesions (FBs) by...

Head and neck squamous cell carcinomas (HNSCC) represent a multifactorial disease of poor prognosis. They have lagged behind other cancers in terms of personalized therapy. With expansion and high throughput sequencing methods, recent landmark exonic studies and Cancer Genome Atlas data have identified genes relevant to carcinogenesis and...

Our aim was to shed light on different steps leading from metabotropic receptor activation to changes in cell shape, such as those that characterize the morphological plasticity of neurohypophysial astrocytes (pituicytes). Using explant cultures of adult rat pituicytes, we have previously established that adenosine A1 receptor activation...

Cytoskeletal rearrangements are central to endothelial cell physiology and are controlled by soluble factors, matrix proteins, cell-cell interactions, and mechanical forces. We previously reported that aortic endothelial cells can rearrange their cytoskeletons into complex actin-based structures called podosomes when a constitutively active...

The role of the extracellular matrix (ECM) in the evolution of certain diseases (e.g. fibrosis, cancer) is generally accepted but yet to be completely understood. A numerical model that captures the physical properties of the ECM, could convey certain connections between the topology of its constituents and their associated biological features....