Dr. Geraldine Aubert (Buchanan), PhD Research Associate Department: Terry Fox Laboratory Contact Information: Tel: (604) 675-8000 ext. 7774 Fax: (604) 877-0712 Email: gaubert@bccrc.ca

Dr. Geraldine Aubert, PhD, is a Research Associate at the Terry Fox Laboratory, a department of the British Columbia Cancer Agency in Vancouver, Canada. She received her undergraduate degree in Applied Biology (Medical Biology and Biochemistry) from the ‘Université de Bourgogne’ in Dijon, France. She obtained a PhD in Hematology in 2004 from University College London (UCL and Royal Free Hospital, United Kingdom) under the supervision of Dr Paul Travers. Her graduate work focused on generating, testing and applying novel tools to monitor specific cellular immune responses following bone marrow transplantation. This work led to a better understanding and to the assessment and enhancement of immunity to specific viral and tumor antigens, which proved to be useful clinical biomarkers. Her most recent research interests, working with Dr Peter Lansdorp, are related to factors that regulate telomere length and to human disease that result from inherited mutations in genes that encode components of the telomerase enzyme complex.

Publications

1. Aubert G*, Baerlocher GM*, Vulto I, Poon SS & Lansdorp PM (*these authors contributed equally to the work). Collapse of telomere homeostasis in hematopoietic stem cells caused by heterozygous mutations in telomerase genes. PLoS Genet (in press).

2. Kent DG, Lin JC & Aubert G. The First AACR Special Conference on Stem Cells, Development, and Cancer: Some of these cells are not like the others. Cancer Res 71(17):5616-20, 2011. View Paper

3. Aubert G. Short telomeres in hematopoietic disorders. Invited mini-review. The Microenvironment. (Canadian Hematology Society newsletter).  July 2011. View Article

4. Aubert G*, Hills M* & Lansdorp PM (*these authors contributed equally to the work). Telomere Length Measurement - caveats and a critical assessment of the available technologies and tools. Invited review (peer reviewed), Mutation Research Reviews special issue on Telomeres and disease. Epub ahead of print, June 2011. View Paper

5. Rusakiewicz S, Aubert G, Clarke RE, Travers PJ, Madrigal A & Dodi AI. Soluble HLA/peptide monomers cross-linked with co-stimulatory antibodies onto a streptavidin core molecule efficiently stimulate Antigen-specific T cell responses. Cancer Immunology Immunotherapy 58:1459-70, 2009. View Abstract

6. Savage SA, Dokal I, Armanios M, Aubert G, Cowen EW, Domingo DL, Giri N, Greene MH, Orchard PJ, Tolar J, Tsilou E, Van Waes C, Wong JMY, Young NS, Alter BP. Dyskeratosis Congenita: The First NIH Clinical Research Workshop. Pediatric Blood & Cancer 53:520-3, 2009. View Paper

7. Aubert G & Lansdorp PM. Telomeres and aging. Physiol Rev. 2008 Apr;88(2):557-79. Review. Citations: 114. View Paper

8. Goldman FD*, Aubert G*, Klingelhutz AJ, Hills M, Cooper SR, Hamilton WS, Schlueter AJ, Lambie K, Eaves CJ & Lansdorp PM (*these authors contributed equally to the work). Characterization of primitive hematopoietic cells from patients with dyskeratosis congenita. Blood 111:4523-31, 2008. Citations: 14. View Paper

9. Shepherd BE, Kiem HP, Lansdorp PM, Dunbar CE, Aubert G, LaRochelle A, Seggewiss R, Guttorp P & Abkowitz JL. Hematopoietic stem-cell behavior in nonhuman primates. Blood 110:1806-13, 2007. View Paper

10. Ouyang Q, Wagner WM, Walter S, Muller CA, Wikby A, Aubert G, Klatt T, Stevanovic S, Dodi T, & Pawelec G. An age-related increase in the number of CD8+ T cells carrying receptors for an immunodominant Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) epitope is counteracted by a decreased frequency of their antigen-specific responsiveness. Mech Ageing Dev 124:477-485, 2003. View Abstract

11. Ouyang Q, Wagner WM, Wikby A, Walter S, Aubert G, Dodi AI, Travers P, & Pawelec G. Large numbers of dysfunctional CD8+ T lymphocytes bearing receptors for a single dominant CMV epitope in the very old. J Clin Immunol 23:247-257, 2003. View Abstract

12. Chen FE, Aubert G, Travers P, Dodi IA & Madrigal A. HLA tetramers and anti-CMV immune responses: from epitope to immunotherapy. Cytotherapy 4:41-48, 2002. View Abstract

13. Szmania S, Galloway A, Bruorton M, Musk P, Aubert G, Arthur A, Pyle H, Hensel N, Ta N, Lamb L, Jr, Dodi T, Madrigal A, Barrett J, Henslee-Downey J & van Rhee F. Isolation and expansion of cytomegalovrius-specific cytotoxic T lymphocytes to clinical scale from a single blood draw using dendritic cells and HLA-tetramers. Blood 98:505-512, 2001. Citations: 103. View Paper

14. Clark RE, Dodi IA, Hill SC, Lill JR, Aubert G, Macintyre AR, Rojas J, Bourdon A, Bonner PL, Wang L, Christmas SE, Travers PJ, Craser CS, Rees RC & Madrigal JA. Direct evidence that leukemic cells present HLA-associated immunogenic peptides derived from the BCR-ABLb3a2 fusion protein. Blood 98:2887-2893, 2001. Citations: 156. View Paper

15. Aubert G, Hassan-Walker AF, Madrigal JA, Emery VC, Morte C, Grace S, Koh MB, Potter M, Prentice HG, Dodi IA & Travers PJ. Cytomegalovirus-specific cellular immune responses and viremia in recipients of allogeneic stem cell transplants. J Infect Dis 184:955-963, 2001. Citations: 70.  View Paper