Manuel Irimia obtained his PhD in 2010 at University of Barcelona investigating the origin of vertebrates at a genomic level. After two postdocs at Stanford University and University of Toronto, he joined the Centre for Genomic Regulation (CRG) in June 2014. He has been elected EMBO Young Investigator (2018) and obtained ERC Starting (2014) and Consolidator (2020) Grants.
Research interests
Manuel Irimia's research is centered on two major questions: How does a single genome sequence encode the information to build the enormous complexity of cell types and structures of an adult organism? How are changes in this sequence translated into morphological novelties during evolution? In his lab, they approach these topics focusing on cell and tissue type specific transcriptomes: How are they encoded in the genome? How are they generated during embryogenesis? How do they impact cell function in adult organisms? How do they evolve and how they impact evolution? To answer these questions, they not only study transcriptional regulation, but also other mechanisms that expand transcriptomic diversity, such as alternative splicing and gene duplication, combining computational and experimental approaches using in vitro and in vivo systems (zebrafish, mouse and fruitfly)
Selected publications
- Torres-Méndez A, Pop S, Bonnal S, Almudi I, Avola A, Roberts RJV, Paolantoni C, Alcaina-Caro A, Martín-Anduaga A, Haussmann IU, Morin V, Casares F, Soller M, Kadener S, Roignant JY, Prieto-Godino L & Irimia M 2022. 'Parallel evolution of a splicing program controlling neuronal excitability in flies and mammals'. Science Advances, 8, eabk0445
- Wyatt CDR, Pernaute B, Gohr A, Miret-Cuesta M, Goyeneche L, Rovira Q, Salzer MC, Boke E, Bogdanovic O, Bonnal S & Irimia M 2022, 'A developmentally programmed splicing failure contributes to DNA damage response attenuation during mammalian zygotic genome activation', Science Advances, 8, eabn4935.
- Ciampi L, Mantica F, López-Blanch L, Permanyer J, Rodriguez-Marín C, Zang J, Cianferoni D, Jiménez-Delgado S, Bonnal S, Miravet-Verde S, Ruprecht V, Neuhauss SCF, Banfi S, Carrella S, Serrano L, Head SA & Irimia M 2022, 'Specialization of the photoreceptor transcriptome by Srrm3-dependent microexons is required for outer segment maintenance and vision', Proceedings Of The National Academy Of Sciences Of The United States Of America, 119, 29, e2117090119.
- Mantica F & Irimia M 2022, 'The 3D-Evo Space: Evolution of Gene Expression and Alternative Splicing Regulation', Annual Review Of Genetics, 56, 315 - 337.
- Spruce T, Plass M, Gohr A, Ray D, Martínez de Lagrán M, Rot G, Nóvoa A, Burguera D, Permanyer J, Miret M, Zheng H, Swanson MS, Morris Q, Mallo M, Dierssen M, Hughes TR, Pernaute B & Irimia M, 2022, 'The X-linked splicing regulator MBNL3 has been co-opted to restrict placental growth in eutherians', PLoS Biol, 20(4):e3001615.
- Gohr A, Mantica F, Hermoso-Pulido A, Tapial J, Márquez Y & Irimia M 2022, 'Computational Analysis of Alternative Splicing Using VAST-TOOLS and the VastDB Framework', Methods Mol Biol, 2537:97-128.
Selected research activities
Two PhD thesis defended (Patryk Polinski and Simon Bajew) and two submitted (Ludovica Ciampi and Federica Mantica).