Prof. Gianluca Tell is Associate Professor of Molecular Biology at the School of Medicine-University of Udine (UNIUD), Italy. He obtained his degree in Biology, 110/110 cum laude, from the University of Trieste-Italy. From 1994 to 2004 he acted as Research Assistant at the Department of Biomedical Scicences and Technologies-University of Udine. In 1996 he was a visiting scientist at the NCI, NIH, Bethesda, MD, USA. He then acted as Assistant Professor at the University of Trieste from 2000 to 2004 and visiting professor in 2006 at the Laboratory of DNA repair (headed by Prof. Sankar Mitra) Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, Unyversity of Texas Medical Branch, Galveston, TX, USA. From 2005 he is chief of the Laboratory of Molecular Biology at the Department of Medical and Biological Sciences of the University of Udine. His prevailing scientific interest is the study of molecular mechanisms of DNA-repair and gene expression in the field of redox signalling and cell oxidative stress. In the last twelve years he devoted himself to the study of the role of the protein APE1 in transcriptional regulation in different cell models and human cancers discovering a new unsuspected role for this protein in RNA metabolism. He coordinated several research projects on these topics granted from different agencies such as: PRIN, ASI, AIRC and Telethon foundations as well as private grants from Procter & Gamble company. He actually acts as a scientific consultant for the Italian Ministry of Research (MIUR), for the Ministry of Science of Georgia, NSERC (Canada), Wellcome Trust (UK), Cancer Research (UK), Science National Medical Research Council (NMRC), Singapore.
He has been recently awarded with the UICC Fellowship, Yoshida Yamashida Memorial grant 2011, to act as Visiting Professor at the Laboratory of DNA repair (headed by Prof. Bruce Demple) at the Department of Pharmacology, Stony Brook University, Stony Brook, NY, USA.

The field of prevailing interest is the study of molecular mechanisms of DNA repair and control of gene expression particularly in the field of redox signalling and cell oxidative stress. Oxygen radicals have been implicated in a number of conditions ranging from aging to cancer. Relatively little is known regarding how ROS, like superoxide and hydrogen peroxide, are regulated in cells and what specific aspects of cellular activity might be influenced by physiological and pathophysiological levels of these molecules. In particular the role of the DNA-repair protein APE1, the main AP-endonuclease of mammalian cells and involved in Base Excision Repair pathway of DNA lesions, is a major focus of our research activity both in ‘in vitro’ and ’in vivo’ models after the recent discovery made in our Lab that this protein may also act on RNA metabolism. In collaboration with the laboratory of chemogenomics at the NIH, Bethesda, MD, USA, we are actually developing new small molecule inhibitors to target this new function of the protein for cancer therapy. Finally, we are hopeful that this molecular understanding will lead to new insights into disease states in which oxidant stress plays a role and help in the design of new therapeutic agents.
The laboratory collaborates with several internationally recognized groups in France, USA, U.K. and China

Gianluca Tell has published 115 peer reviewed articles indexed in PubMed. In 35 articles he is listed as corresponding author and in 23 as first author. His publications have received approximately 2.300 citations with an H-index of 24. Total impact factor is >300. His most quoted experimental paper [Redox potential controls the structure and DNA binding activity of the paired domain. Tell G, Scaloni A, Pellizzari L, Formisano S, Pucillo C, Damante G. J. Biol. Chem. 1998] has 80 citations and is his most quoted first author paper and ranks 4th. His most quoted last author paper [Activation of APE1/Ref-1 is dependent on reactive oxygen species generated after purinergic receptor stimulation by ATP. Pines A, Perrone L, Bivi N, Romanello M, Damante G, Gulisano M, Kelley MR, Quadrifoglio F, Tell G. Nucleic Acids Research, 2005] ranks 8th with 56 quotes.
He authored more than 100 publications in international peer reviewed journals with a total I.F. >300. He acts as a Referee for 20 international peer-reviewed including journals Cancer Research, Nucleic Acids Research and Oncogene.
The five most recent publications excluding reviews are as follows:
1. Fantini D, Vascotto C, Marasco D, D'Ambrosio C, Romanello M, Vitagliano L, Pedone C, Poletto M, Cesaratto L, Quadrifoglio F, Scaloni A, Radicella JP, Tell G. Critical lysine residues within the overlooked N-terminal domain of human APE1 regulate its biological functions. Nucleic Acids Res. (2010), 38:8239-56.
2. Deganuto M, Cesaratto L, Bellarosa C, Calligaris R, Vilotti S, Renzone G, Foti R, Scaloni A, Gustincich S, Quadrifoglio F, Tiribelli C, Tell G. A proteomic approach to the bilirubin-induced toxicity in neuronal cells reveals a protective function of DJ-1 protein. Proteomics. (2010), 10:1645-57
3. Vascotto C., Cesaratto L., Zeef L.A.H., Deganuto M., D’Ambrosio C., Scaloni A., Romanello M., Damante G., Taglialatela G., Delneri D., Kelley M.R., Mitra S., Quadrifoglio F., Tell G. Genome-wide analysis and proteomic studies reveal APE1/Ref-1 multifunctional role in mammalian cells. Proteomics (2009), 9:1058-1074.
4. Vascotto C, Fantini D, Romanello M, Cesaratto L, Deganuto M, Leonardi A,Radicella JP, Kelley MR, D'Ambrosio C, Scaloni A, Quadrifoglio F, Tell G. APE1/Ref-1 interacts with NPM1 within nucleoli and plays a role in the rRNA quality control process. Mol. Cell Biol. (2009), 29:1834-54.
5. Grassi F, Tell G, Robbie-Ryan M, Gao Y, Terauchi M, Yang X, Romanello M, Jones DP, Weitzmann MN, Pacifici R. Oxidative stress causes bone loss in estrogen-deficient mice through enhanced bone marrow dendritic cell activation. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. (2007) 104:15087-92.

No projects are available to students for the current accademic year.