Joe Harman

MRes, BSc (Hons)

DPhil student

I am a Medical Sciences DPhil student primarily co-supervised by Thomas Milne and Marella de Bruijn. I am additionally co-supervised by Irene Roberts and Edward Morrissey. I finished my BSc Biomedical Science 2013 and MRes Medical Research in 2015 at the University of Reading. I then worked as a research assistant in the de Bruijn lab, before starting my DPhil program.

My research interests focus on the creation and usage of gene regulatory networks to explain biological processes. I have used bioinformatics based approaches to establish transcription factor interaction networks that describe the transcriptional landscape downstream of the MLL-AF4 fusion protein in MLL-rearranged leukaemia. In parallel I have also explored the networks that control the embryonic generation of haematopoietic stem cells through an endothelial-to-haematopoietic transition. A key factor in both of these network models is the RUNX1 transcription factor, which is overexpressed by MLL-AF4 and is critically required for the endothelial-to-haematopoietic transition.