Michele Boiani

I am a habilitated doctor at the Westphalian Wilhelms University and a group leader at the Max Planck Institute for Molecular Biomedicine, both in Muenster (NRW, Germany). I received my education in reproductive biology and am a certified biologist as well as a laboratory animal scientist. I studied and trained at the University of Pavia (Italy), at the Rigshospitalet (Denmark) and at the University of Pennsylvania (USA), where I developed a keen interest in the mammalian oocyte with emphasis on the ooplasm’s ability to convert somatic nuclei from a differentiated to a toti/pluripotential state of gene expression (‘reprogramming’). In my research, I have shown that oocyte-mediated nuclear reprogramming in mice is an orderly process that is amenable to control by cell-cell interactions (embryo aggregation) and in vitro culture conditions (culture media as epigenetic modifiers). Currently my team investigates the factors that influence totipotency in early mouse embryos, such as: 1) oocytic i.e. maternal factors (Reproduction 148:55-72, 2014); 2) environmental factors e.g. culture conditions (Human Reproduction 27:2627-2640, 2012), and 3) apportionment of molecular determinants at first zygotic cleavage (Scientific Reports 7(1):8299, 2017; Molecular Human Reproduction 25(11):729-744, 2019). As a respected member of the nuclear transfer and preimplantation embryo community I have published over 60 peer-reviewed publications in prime journals and have written numerous book chapters on nuclear reprogramming by oocytes and on embryonic stem cells. I received support from the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) and from the Max Planck Gesellschaft (MPG).