3D CELL  BIOLOGY

I am a passionate scientist, who earned MS in biology at the Jagiellonian University (graduated with honours), which is one the Europe´s oldest universities and the best Polish university.

 

I expanded my education and lab work experience by doing several internships in molecular biology and cell biology in Poland (Jagiellonian University in Cracow, Poznan University of Medical Sciences, Warsaw University) and abroad (University Medical Centre Utrecht, the Netherlands). After the studies I was working at the Collegium Medicum Jagiellonian University in Cracow, Czech Academy of Sciences in Prague and Helmholtz Zentrum München.

 

I received my PhD at the Technische Universität München (Germany), where I was working at the medical department on the project ´´Role of myofibroblasts as niche cells in homeostasis and gastrointestinal carcinogenesis´´ in the laboratory of PD. Dr. med. M. Quante.

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In my PhD project I have studied mesenchymal-epithelial cross-talk in the intestinal stem cell niche. My research model involved several three dimensional cell culture systems such as crypt culture, known also as intestinal organoid culture (1 - 3), and air-liquid interface cultures such as organotypic cell culture (3, 4) and tissue culture ex vivo (3, 5). In my project I addressed the following questions: How does the niche regulate proliferation and differentiation in the intestinal crypt? Can the niche contribute to tumor initiation in the intestinal crypt? In parallel I have been working on a translational project aimed at the establishment of human-derived organoids from Barrett´s Esophagus and esophageal adenocarcinoma biopsies.

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References

1. Sato T, Vries RG, Snippert HJ, et al. Single Lgr5 stem cells build crypt-villus structures in vitro without a mesenchymal niche. Nature. 2009;459(7244):262-5.

2. Pastula A, Quante M. Isolation and 3-dimensional Culture of Primary Murine Intestinal Epithelial Cells. BioProtocol. 2014.

3. Pastuła A, Middelhoff M, Brandtner A, et al., Three-Dimensional Gastrointestinal Organoid Culture in Combination with Nerves or Fibroblasts: A Method to Characterize the Gastrointestinal Stem Cell Niche, Stem Cells Int. 2016;2016:3710836.

4. Kalabis J, Wong GS, Vega ME et al. Isolation and characterization of mouse and human esophageal epithelial cells in 3D organotypic culture. Nature protocols. 2012;7(2):235-46.

5. Ootani A, Li X, Sangiorgi E, Ho QT et al. Sustained in vitro intestinal epithelial culture within a Wnt-dependent stem cell niche. Nature medicine. 2009;15(6):701-6.