Katya Ravid

Professor of Medicine and Biochemistry

Director, Evans Center for Interdisciplinary Biomedical Research

Education:

DSc/PhD, Technion-Israel Institute of Technology

Post-Doc, Massachusetts Institute of Technology

General field of research:

Blood Stem Cells; Cardiovascular; Cell Cycle Control

Affiliations other than medicine:

Evans Center for Interdisciplinary Biomedical Research

Whitaker Cardiovascular Institute

Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics

Contact information:

Office

700 Albany Street, W-601

Boston, MA 02118

Phone: (617) 638-5053

Lab

700 Albany Street, W-500

Boston, MA 02118

Phone: (617) 638-5095

kravid@bu.edu; ravid@biochem.bumc.bu.edu

Other research websites:

http://www.bumc.bu.edu/exchweb/bin/redir.asp?URL=http://www.bumc.bu.edu/ravidlab/

http://www.bumc.bu.edu/transgenic

http://www.bumc.bu.edu/cardiograd

http://www.bu.edu/cores/cores/animal-research.html

http://www.bumc.bu.edu/medicine/evansbiomedicalresearch

Research group information:

Dan Yang, MD, PhD, Research Instructor, danyang@bu.edu

Hongjie Chen, PhD, Post Doc, hjchen@biochem.bumc.bu.edu

Nicholas Papadantonakis, MD, Research Scholar, np@bu.edu

Alexia Eliades, Graduate Student, aeliades@bu.edu

Milka Koupenova, Graduate Student, milka@bu.edu

Shannon Carroll, Graduate Student, scarroll@biochem.bumc.bu.edu

Hillary Johnston-Cox, MD/PhD Student, hjcox@bu.edu

Keywords:

Megakaryocytes, Platelets, Stem Cells, Blood Cells, Thrombosis, Vascular Biology, Cell Cycle, Gene Expression

ravidtubulin

Staining of tubulin in a polyploid megakaryocyte (DJ. McCrann in Dr. Ravid’s lab)

Summary of research interest:

The cells of all blood lineages arise from pluripotent hematopoietic stem cells that reside in the marrow. The bone marrow also contains stem cells of other lineages, including fat, vascular etc. Our research is focused on two interrelated projects that bear on mechanisms associated with the development of blood and vascular pathologies: (1) molecular mechanisms involved in cell cycle control during the development of bone marrow megakaryocytes into platelets, a process that includes cellular polyploidization prior to platelet fragmentation. We also identified mechanisms of polyploidy in vascular smooth muscle cells, and found that the degree of polyploidy serves as an excellent biomarker for aging; (2) the role of vascular and bone marrow cell (progenitors and mature) adenosine receptors in vascular regeneration during injury or atherosclerosis. Transgenic and knockout models are used to assist in exploring mechanisms in vivo.

Selected publications:

McCrann DJ, Eliades A, Makitalo M, Matsuno K, Ravid K. (2009) Differential expression of NADPH oxidases in megakaryocytes and their role in polyploidy. Blood. 2009 Aug 6;114(6):1243-9. PMID: 19471020

Nguyen HG, Makitalo M, Yang D, Chinnappan D, St Hilaire C, Ravid K. (2009) Deregulated Aurora-B induced tetraploidy promotes tumorigenesis. FASEB J. 2009 Aug;23(8):2741-8. PMID: 19332642

McCrann DJ, Yang D, Chen H, Carroll S, Ravid K. (2009) Upregulation of Nox4 in the aging vasculature and its association with smooth muscle cell polyploidy. Cell Cycle. 2009 Mar 21;8(6). [Epub ahead of print] PMID: 19221493

Liu, L., Brown, D., McKee, M., Lebrasseur, N.K., Yang, D., Albrecht, K.H., Ravid, K, and Pilch, P.F. (2008) Deletion of Cavin/PTRF causes global loss of caveolae, dyslipidemia, and glucose intolerance. Cell Metab. 2008 8(4):310-7. PMID: 18840361

Yang, D., Koupenova, M., McCrann, D.J., Kopeikina, K.J., Kagan, H., Schreiber, B.M., and Ravid, K. (2008) The A2b adenosine receptor protects against vascular injury. PNAS 05(2):792-796. PMID: 18184815

Grenz, A., Osswald, H., Eckle, T. Yang, D., Zhang, H., Z. V., Tran, Klingel, K., Ravid, K., and Eltzschig, H. K. (2008) The reno-vascular A2B adenosine receptor protects the kidney from ischemia. PLoS Medicine Jun 24;5(6):e137. PMID: 18578565

Papadantonakis, N, Makitalo, M, McCrann, DJ, Liu, K., Nguyen, HG, Martin, G., Patel-Hett, G., Italiano, JE, and Ravid, K. Direct visualization of the endomitotic cell cycle in living megakaryocytes: differential patterns in low and high ploidy cells. Cell Cycle. 2008 Aug;7(15):2352-6. PMID: 18677109

McCrann, D.J., Yezefski, T., Nguyen, H.G., Liu, H., Wen, Q., Crispino, J.D., and Ravid, K. (2008) Survivin overexpression in transgenic mice does not alter megakaryocyte ploidy status nor interfere with erythroid/megakaryocytic lineage development. Blood 111(8):4092-5

Yang, D., McCrann, DJ, Nguyen, H.G., St. Hilaire, C. DePinho R.A., Jones, M.R., and Ravid, K. (2007) Increased polyploidy in aortic vascular smooth muscle cells during aging is marked by cellular senescence. Aging Cell 6:257-260.

Yang,D., Zhang, Y. Nguyen, H.G., Koupenova, M., Chauhan, A.K., Makitalo, M., Jones, M. R., St. Hilaire, C., Toselli, P., Lamperti, E., Schreiber, B.M., Gavras, H., Wagner, D.D. and Ravid, K. (2006) The A2b adenosine receptor protects against inflammation and excessive vascular adhesion. Journal of Clinical Investigation 116:1913-1923.

Technologies available for sharing upon request:

Bone marrow cell isolation and culturing; immunostaining; atherosclerosis models; platelet function; megakaryocyte preparation; cell cycle control; ploidy analysis