Introduction
Wolf Reik FRS is a molecular biologist, senior group leader and associate director at the Babraham Institute, professor of Epigenetics at the University of Cambridge and associate faculty at the Sanger Institute. Wolf Reik studies how additional information can be added to the genome through a range of processes collectively called epigenetics. He discovered some of the key epigenetic mechanisms important for mammalian development, physiology, genome reprogramming, and human diseases. His early work led to the discovery that the molecular mechanism of genomic imprinting is based on DNA methylation. He uncovered non-coding RNA and chromatin looping regulating imprinted genes, which he showed to be involved in fetal nutrition, growth, and disease. He discovered epigenetic reprogramming, including active demethylation, and showed that it was faulty in reproductive cloning and affects pluripotency of embryonic stem cells. He found that the environment influences epigenetic programming in embryos, with changes in gene expression persisting in adults and their offspring.
Awards and recognition
Wolf Reik has received many awards, including:
- 2011, elected member of the Academia Europaea
- 2010, elected Fellow of the Royal Society of London
- 2003, elected member of the European Molecular Biology Organisation (EMBO)
- 2003 Elected Fellow of the Academy of Medical Sciences
- 1994 awarded the Wellcome Prize in Physiology
- "Wolf Reik's page at Academia Europeae". Ae-info.org. Retrieved 2014-01-02.