ALAIN VERREAULT, Ph.D.
- Principal Investigator, Chromosome Biogenesis Laboratory, Institute for Research in Immunology and Cancer
- Associate Professor, Department of Pathology and Cell Biology, Faculty of Medicine, Université de Montréal
AWARDS & HONOURS
- Canada Research Chair in Nucleosome Assembly and Genome Integrity, 2006–
- Fellow of the Jane Coffin Childs Memorial Fund for Medical Research, 1994-1997
- Fellow of the Cambridge Commonwealth Trust, 1990
- Canadian Ph.D. Studentship, Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada, 1989
- Overseas Research Student Award, Committee of Vice-Chancellors and Principals of the United Kingdom, 1989
- Undergraduate Research Award, Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada, 1987
TRAINING
- Postdoctoral training with Dr. Bruce Stillman, Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, New York, 1994-1998
- Ph.D. in biochemistry, University of Cambridge, United Kingdom, 1993
- B.Sc. in biochemistry, Université Laval, Canada, 1988
RESEARCH SUPPORT
- Canadian Foundation for Innovation
- Canadian Institutes of Health Research
A native of the Gaspé, Alain Verreault spent fifteen years in the United Kingdom and the United States before returning to Montreal in December 2005. He is now a Principal Investigator at the Institute for Research in Immunology and Cancer (IRIC) and an Associate Professor in the Department of Pathology and Cell Biology at the Université de Montréal.
After completing a B.Sc. in biochemistry at Université Laval and a Ph.D. at the University of Cambridge, Dr. Verreault did his postdoctoral training at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory in New York. Throughout his training, he maintained a strong interest in the molecular mechanisms that help package histones and DNA into chromosomes during DNA replication.
In 1999, Dr. Verreault was recruited by the Imperial Cancer Research Fund, now known as Cancer Research UK, where he directed a laboratory for seven years. During this period, Dr. Verreault and his colleagues discovered a novel role for DNA damage-induced protein kinases in the regulation of chromosome assembly. They published an article in Cell showing that histones, which had been widely regarded as extremely stable proteins, are in fact rapidly degraded when DNA synthesis abruptly slows down. For instance, this occurs during the response to genotoxic agents that interfere with DNA replication. The degradation of excess histones represents an hitherto unsuspected aspect of the DNA damage response that has important implications for cell survival and the maintenance of genomic integrity.
Dr. Verreault joined IRIC in 2005. Since then, he has pursued his studies of nucleosome assembly. Notably, Dr. Verreault and his colleagues have uncovered a novel and exciting feature of the chromosome cycle. During S-phase, all the newly synthesised histones deposited throughout the genome are acetylated at a specific site and this modification plays a crucial role in the response to genotoxic agents that damage DNA replication forks (Nature 2005; Curr. Biol. 2006; Genetics 2008; Cell 2008). Since many chemotherapeutic agents kill cancer cells by damaging DNA during replication, Dr. Verreault hopes that valuable clinical applications will emerge from this work. For instance, the enzymes that acetylate newly synthesised histones represent potential targets for novel anti-neoplastic agents.
SELECTED PUBLICATIONS
Delgoshaie N, Wurtele H, Verreault A (2009) Histone acetylation floods the human cell cycle and DNA damage response. Cell Cycle 8: 1820.
Gharib M, Marcantonio M, Lehmann SG, Courcelles M, Meloche S, Verreault A, Thibault P (2009) Artifactual sulfation of silver-stained proteins: implications for the assignment of phosphorylation and sulfation sites. Mol. Cell Proteomics 8: 506-518.
Drogaris P, Wurtele H, Masumoto H, Verreault A, Thibault P (2008) Comprehensive profiling of histone modifications using a label-free approach and its applications in determining structure-function relationships. Analytical Chem. 80: 6698-6707.
Li Q, Zhou H, Wurtele, H, Davies B, Horazdovsky B, Verreault A, Zhang Z (2008) Acetylation of histone H3 lysine 56 regulates replication-coupled nucleosome assembly. Cell 134: 244-255.
Tang Y, Holbert MA, Wurtele H, Meeth K, Rocha W, Gharib M, Jiang E, Thibault P, Verreault A, Cole PA, Marmorstein R (2008) Fungal Rtt109 histone acetyltransferase is an unexpected structural homolog of p300/CBP. Nat. Struct. Mol. Biol. 15: 738-745.
Celic I, Verreault A, Boeke JD (2008) Histone H3 K56 hyperacetylation perturbs replisomes and causes DNA damage. Genetics 179: 1769-1784.
Murzina NV, Pei XY, Zhang W, Sparkes M, Vicente-Garcia J, Pratap JV, McLaughlin SH, Ben-Shahar TR, Verreault A, Luisi BF, Laue ED (2008) Structural basis for the recognition of histone H4 by the histone chaperone RbAp46. Structure 16: 1077-1085.
Groth A, Rocha W, Verreault A, Almouzni G (2007) Chromatin challenges during DNA replication and repair. Cell 128: 721-733.
Xhemalce B, Miller KM, Driscoll R, Masumoto H, Jackson SP, Kouzarides T, Verreault A, Arcangioli B (2007) Regulation of histone H3 lysine 56 acetylation in Schizosaccharomyces pombe. J. Biol. Chem. 282: 15040-15047.
Celic I, Masumoto H, Griffith WP, Meluh P, Cotter RJ, Boeke JD, Verreault A (2006) The sirtuins Hst3 and Hst4p preserve genome integrity by controlling histone H3 lysine 56 deacetylation. Curr Biol 16: 1280-1289.
Masumoto H, Hawke D, Kobayashi R, Verreault A (2005) A role for cell-cycle-regulated histone H3 lysine 56 acetylation in the DNA damage response. Nature 436: 294-298.
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