Daniel Lucas

Cincinnati Children's Medical Center, USA

I completed my PhD training at the Autonomous University of Madrid under the supervision of Drs. Antonio Bernad and Luis Blanco. There we generated the knockout model for the error prone DNA polymerase mu and showed that this enzyme is required for DNA repair and normal hematopoiesis. This prompted me to join the lab of Paul Frenette to study hematopoietic stem cell biology in the bone marrow. There we identified the role of the sympathetic nervous system in regulating stem cell niches and leukocyte trafficking in homeostasis and regeneration. We also showed that mature blood cells like macrophages and megakaryocytes can also regulate hematopoietic stem cell numbers and function. After starting my own research group, I realized that very little was known about the niches that regulate progenitors downstream of the hematopoietic stem cell. My lab uses state of the art imaging strategies to study the crosstalk between the bone marrow microenvironment and blood progenitors in situ.