Alexis Poncy

PhD student

De Duve Institut

Brussels, Belgium

I studied Biochemistry at the National Institute of Applied Sciences (INSA), in Toulouse (France), and obtained the degree of engineer in August 2010. Except for two internships in a research laboratory (de Duve Institute, research group on "Protein Folding in Bacteria") and in an R&D department of the company Puratos, my current thesis is my first work experience.

Project:

I am carrying out my thesis within the "Liver & Pancreas Development" research group at the de Duve Institute in Brussels. Earlier work in the group has shown that the transcription factor Sox9 controls biliary development (Antoniou A. et al., Gastroenterology 2009). My project consists in characterizing the mechanism of action of Sox9 in bile duct formation, and in unraveling the role of other Sox proteins in liver development.