Martina Hallegger

Martina Hallegger is leading the research program on how deregulated RNA metabolism contributes to the earliest events in the molecular pathogenesis of motor neurone disease (MND), and how we can modulate this for therapeutic interventions. By applying high-throughput methods like iCLIP (cross-linking Immuno-precipitation), RNAseq and proteomics, she studies the central role of RNA-protein condensates in MND. 

Martina investigates how concentrating biopolymers via condensation is fundamental to cellular organisation and physiology, and she uniquely focuses on its effect on RNA regulation. She is particularly interested in how the altered condensation properties of the RNA-binding protein TDP-43, which is central to MND pathology, contribute to altered RNA metabolism in neurons and in vitro.

Most recently Martina held an MND Association Lady Edith Wolfson Senior Non-Clinical Fellow at the Institute of Neurology, UCL, and later on at the UK DRI at King’s and the Francis Crick Institute, where she is a Visiting Research Fellow. 

She began her scientific career during her postgraduate work at the University of Vienna, and subsequently during a Postdoctoral position in the Department of Biochemistry at the University of Cambridge with the main objective of uncovering how the genetic information in our cells is amplified by combinatorial mechanisms called ‘alternative splicing’ and ‘RNA editing’. As an OPDC fellow at the University of Oxford, she laid the foundation for working in RNomics in neurodegeneration by investigating how non-coding RNAs shape cell function, particularly in neurons affected in Parkinson’s disease. 

If you are interested in her approaches, would like to collaborate or join her team, then please get in touch with her. 

Hiring now: Apply before the 2nd of December for two post-doc positions available on how altered condensation of TDP-43 changes RNA metabolism. Biophysics of protein-RNA condensates and neuronal transcriptomics: 

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