Pia Cosma

Pia Cosma

Centre de Regulació Genòmica

Life & Medical Sciences

ICREA Research Professor and Senior Scientist at Centre for Genomic Regulation (CRG), since Sep. 2010. From 2009-2015 Honorary Associate Investigator at CNR. 2003-2010 Associate Investigator at TIGEM, Naples. 2004-2010 Lecturer at European School of Molecular Medicine. 1997-2000 Marie Curie Postdoc at IMP, Vienna. PhD in Cellular and Molecular Genetics, Univ. Federico II of Naples, 2000. Visiting Scientist in many Universities in USA. Awarded several prizes including: EMBO Young Investigator (YIP), 2003; Marie Curie Excellence Award, 2005; "Vanguardia de la Ciència" prize, 2014; City of Barcelona prize, 2015. She is Order of Merit of the Italian Republic: Knight, 2007. ERC Starting Grant awardee, 2009 and HFSP Grant awardee, 2010. EMBO Member since 2010. Coordinator of H2020 FET-Open, Cellviewer, since 2016 and Launchpad. La Caixa Health Reacher Award in 2018. Coordinator of H2020 FET-Open, EcaBox, 2021


Research interests

Main interests of Cosma’s group are to dissect mechanisms and factors controlling somatic cell reprogramming and tissue regeneration in mammals. We showed that activation of the Wnt/ß-catenin signalling pathway enhances reprogramming of somatic cells after their fusion with embryonic stem cells. We are dissecting gene networks and reprogramming factors controlled by the activation of Wnt/ß-catenin pathway. Furthermore, by using super resolution microscopy we are investigating on the remodelling and looping of the chromatin fiber during the reprograming process. The activation of Wnt pathway controls regeneration in response to damage in lower and higher vertebrates. We found that the Wnt/ß-catenin signalling is also key to control cell-fusion-mediated regeneration in mammals. We recently showed that in vivo reprogramming of neurons and hepatocytes after fusion with hematopoietic stem and progenitor cells is a mechanism for tissue regeneration.

Selected publications

– Lakadamyali, Melike; Cosma, Maria Pia 2020, ‘Visualizing the genome in high resolution challenges our textbook understanding’, Nature Methods, 17, pages371–379.

– Ritschka, Birgit; Knauer-Meyer, Tania; Sampaio Goncalves, Daniel; Mas, Alba; Plassat, Jean-Luc; Durik, Matej; Jacobs, Hugues; Pedone, Elisa; Di Vicino, Umberto; Cosma, Maria Pia ; Keyes, William M. 2020, ‘The senotherapeutic drug ABT-737 disrupts aberrant p21 expression to restore liver regeneration in adult mice’, Genes & Development, 34, 7-8, 489 – 494.

– Aulicino, Francesco; Pedone, Elisa; Sottile, Francesco; Lluis, Frederic; Marucci, Lucia; Cosma, Maria Pia 2020, ‘Canonical Wnt Pathway Controls mESC Self-Renewal Through Inhibition of Spontaneous Differentiation via beta-Catenin/TCF/LEF Functions’, Stem Cell Reports, 15, 3, 646 – 661.

– Arumugam K, Shin W, Schiavone V, Tu T, Romo R, Paull E, Subramaniam P, Worley J, Califano C & Cosma MP 2020, ‘The Master Regulator protein BAZ2B can reprogram human hematopoietic lineage-committed progenitors into a multipotent state‘. Cell Reports, 33(10):108474.


Selected research activities

Invited talks:

– 12th FENS FORUM in Neuroscience, Glasgow, UK, 12-15 July 2020

– ICG Cellomics, Qindao, China. 21-22 November 2020.