Our research focuses on the control of cell growth and proliferation and its deregulation in human tumors.

We study transcription factors such as Myc and SREBP proteins that control gene expression programs involved in central biological processes such as cell cycle progression, apoptosis, protein translation and metabolism.

Our work aims to understand how these factors work and how they are regulated and to use this knowledge for novel strategies for tumor therapy.

The department is part of the
Comprehensive Cancer Center Mainfranken.

Pedrotti L, Weiste C, Nägele T, Wolf E, Lorenzin F, DietrichK, Mair A, Weckwerth W, Teige M, Baena-González E, Dröge-Laser W (2018) Snf1-RELATEDKINASE1-Controlled C/S1-bZIP Signaling Activates Alternative MitochondrialMetabolic Pathways to Ensure Plant Survival in Extended Darkness. The Plantcell

Rickman,D. S., Schulte, J. H., Eilers,M. (2017) The expanding world of N-Myc driven tumors. Cancer Discovery, in press

Dejure,F.R., Eilers, M. (2017)MYC and tumor metabolism: chicken and egg. EMBO J. Nov 10. pii: e201796438.doi: 10.15252/embj.201796438. [Epub ahead of print] Review. PubMed PMID:29127156.

Büchel, G., Carstensen, A., Mak, K.Y., Roeschert, I., Leen, E., Sumara, O., Hofstetter, J., Herold, S., Kalb, J., Baluapuri, A., Poon, E., Kwok, C., Chesler, L., Maric H. M., Rickman, D. S., Wolf, E., Bayliss, R., Walz, S., Eilers, M. Association with Aurora-A controls N-MYC-dependent promoter escape and pause release of RNA polymerase II during cell cycle (2017). Cell Reports in press

Jennifer M. Gerlach, Michael Furrer, Maria Gallant, Dirk Birkel, Apoorva Baluapuri, Elmar Wolf, and Peter Gallant (2017) PAF1 complex component Leo1 helps recruit Drosophila Myc to promoters, PNAS, doi: 10.1073/pnas.1705816114

Klein-Hessling, S., Muhammad, K., Klein, M., Pusch, T., Rudolf, R., Floter, J., Qureischi, M., Beilhack, A., Vaeth, M., Kummerow, C., Backes, C., Schoppmeyer, R., Hahn, U., Hoth, M., Bopp, T., Berberich-Siebelt, F., Patra, A., Avots, A., Muller, N., Schulze, A. & Serfling, E. (2017) NFATc1 controls the cytotoxicity of CD8+ T cells, Nature Communication 8, 511.