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Grant recipient

Julien Duxin

Mechanisms of sensing, removal, and bypass of DNA-protein crosslinks
Grant amount: DKK 9,440,226

Julien Duxin says: “DNA-protein crosslinks (DPCs) are dangerous lesions found in our genome. If not repaired, DPCs cause aging and cancer in humans. Moreover, most chemotherapeutics used in the clinic kill cancer cells by generating DPCs. Despite their relevance to humans, we know little about how these lesions are repaired. A major difficulty is to reliably monitor DPCs in cells, which is currently not possible using existing methods. To bypass this barrier, we have recently used protein extracts derived from frog eggs to recapitulate DPC repair in a test tube. This unique approach allowed us to uncover the existence of specialized processes operating in our cells that remove DPCs and thereby prevents cancer and aging. Because these lesions are incredibly diverse, we are now proposing to use our unique approach to study the repair of the major classes of DPCs so that we can establish overarching principles of how these lesions are sensed and removed from the genome.”

Julien Duxin is of French Nationality, with both a PhD and a postdoctoral stay in the US. In 2016 he was recruited as an associate professor to University of Copenhagen.

Julien Duxin
Julien Duxin
Associate Professor, Center for Protein Research (CPR), University of Copenhagen