The CrickConnect team are delighted to be able to invite community members to join us for the institute's regular Crick Lecture.

Crick Lectures provide a broad insight into biomedical research from leading scientists. Not to be missed, the one-hour lectures are the event of the week for the Crick community to come together. The lectures aim to be accessible to scientists across different disciplines, while also offering something for the specialist.

This week, Crick alumni and Professor and Director of Research, Institute of Cellular and Molecular Medicine at the University of Copenhagen, Jesper Svejstrup, will be giving the lecture "Transcription of protein-coding genes". 

There will also be an opportunity to catch up with colleagues and friends over refreshments after the Lecture from 17:00. If you are able to join us in person at the Crick please let us know at connect@crick.ac.uk so we can arrange access.

Jesper Svejstrup

Jesper received his PhD from Aarhus University in Denmark (1993), based on work on DNA topoisomerases. He was then a postdoc in Roger Kornberg's laboratory at Stanford University (1993-1996), before starting his lab at Clare Hall Laboratories (1996). He received tenure in 2000.

His lab became part of the Cancer Research UK London Research Institute in 2002 and became part of the Francis Crick Institute in 2015.

In recognition of his laboratory's contributions to scientific progress, Jesper was elected to the European Molecular Biology Organization (EMBO) in 2003, to the Royal Society in 2009 and the Academy of Medical Sciences in 2018.

Jesper is now Professor and Director of Research, Institute of Cellular and Molecular Medicine at the University of Copenhagen and a visiting scientist at the Crick. 

The Mechanism of Transcription Lab investigates the molecular mechanisms of transcription, and how this essential cellular process interfaces with other DNA-related processes, such a DNA replication and repair. It studies the interface between transcription and other DNA-related processes, such as DNA repair, replication, and recombination.

One of the hallmarks of human disease, including cancer, is the deregulation of gene expression: genes that are supposed to be inactive become activated, or vice versa. Another characteristic of cancer cells is their unstable genomes. They are unable to repair or maintain the integrity of their DNA. Over the last decade, it has also become increasingly clear that the process of transcription itself entails a significant risk for genome stability.