Karla M Neugebauer, PhD

Karla Neugebauer holds a BS in Biology from Cornell University and a PhD in Neuroscience from UCSF. She switched gears to RNA biology as a postdoc with Mark Roth at Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center. There she participated in the initial description of the SR protein family of splicing regulators and was inspired to study RNA metabolism in vivo by combining imaging, genomics, and sequencing strategies. From 2001-2013 she was a Research Group Leader at the Max Planck Institute of Cell biology and Genetics in Dresden Germany. In 2013, she moved to Yale as a Professor of Molecular Biophysics and Biochemistry and of Cell Biology. She has been the Director of the Yale Center for RNA Science and Biomedicine since 2018 and was recognized internationally for her work in RNA Biology by the RNA Society (2017 mid-career award). She has studied splicing in relation to nuclear speckles and discovered that most introns are removed during the process, or co-transcriptionally. Her lab has shown that snRNP assembly occurs in membraneless organelles called Cajal bodies (CBs) and that depletion of the CB scaffolding protein coilin is lethal in zebrafish embryos, due to a deficit in splicing. She is passionate about climate change, believing that everyone has something to contribute to meet its challenges. She is currently developing biochemistry curriculum to show the relevance of the discipline to meeting the current and future needs of our planet.