the invadosome consortium

Research Interests

The list of cells types endowed with the capacity to form podosomes is short but growing. We have discovered that vascular endothelial cells can be induced to form these structures. Under certain conditions, endothelial cells from arterial origin form podosomes in response to the inflammatory cytokine TGFb. Our research focuses on further characterization of endothelial podosomes with the following goals: i) provide evidence for their existence in vivo, ii) determine in which physiological context endothelial cells form podosomes, iii) decipher which signalling pathways act downstream of physiological inducers, and iv) discover the function of endothelial podosomes i.e. in which process are they involved.