Developmental Pathology Bonn

11/12/2025

Yesterday, our Ph. D. Student Andjela Kovacevic successfully defended her thesis. Her experiments helped to unravel part of the complex cytoarcitecture of s***m. She focused on Cylicin1, Cylicin2 and Actrt3, elaborating on the role of these genes in acrosome biogenesis and perinuclear theca. These results contribute to the growing portfolio of genes involved in human male factor infertility. Congratulations, well deserved!

20/08/2025

Cool thing. Our research regarding male infertility got featured in a post from the German News Outlet “Tagesschau”.

Vor 65 Jahren kam die Antibabybille auf den Markt. Heute sind immer weniger Frauen bereit, sich alleine um die Empfängnisverhütung zu kümmern. Forschende suchen daher nach der Pille für den Mann. Von Daniela Remus.

25/04/2025

Our latest paper with our Ph. D. student Aylin Hansen as first author got commented on in Nature Reviews Urology. Nice!

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02/04/2025

New on Biorxiv! In our quest to resolve the complex molecular cytoskeletal structure of the s***m head, we generated and analyzed ArpM1 (Actrt3) deficient mice. We demonstrate, that loss of ArpM1 leads Acrosomal defects and subfertility. Check the manuscript, we determined some of the interactions with other proteins. Lead by our Ph.D. student, Andela Kovacevic, this represents a team effort, since many present and previous members of the lab contributed to the story. Thanks to all!

Actin-related proteins (Arps) are a superfamily of proteins which share sequence similarities with conventional actin and are involved in different cellular processes. Actin-related protein M1 (ARPM1) also known as actin-related protein T3 (ACTRT3) is a testis-enriched Arp which can be found in the....

02/04/2025

Our latest manuscript with our Ph. D. student Aylin Hansen as first author was published in Andrology yesterday. We show, that an inhibitor of BRD9 (iBRD9) is highly effective on human germ cell tumors. Thanks to all the coauthors for contributing, congratulations Aylin.

The data implicate I-BRD9 as a possible treatment alternative for TGCTs.

11/09/2024

Our busy September continues. We are attending symposium in Münster where novel contraceptive methods are being discussed. Our mouse models are formidable tools for male contraception research so Andjela and Gina presented their posters abour Cylicins and Act|7b deficient mice.

10/09/2024

Off to a further meeting. Now in Münster, Germany. The aim is, to push reproductive science and utilize it to develop male contraceptives. Really looking forward to meet the experts.

10/09/2024

Attended the EAA Meeting in Stockholm last week. Met with Lena Arevalo, who is now Professor in Madrid at INIA-CSIC - Department of Animal Reproduction (right). She was invited to give at talk on the biology of Protamines, our joint project. Andela Kovacevic (middle) got selected to talk about our Cylicin story and Gina Merges (left) presented a poster on Actl7b, which got awarded best poster. Congratulations to all of you. It is a blast to have you in the lab looking forward to the next projects.

29/02/2024

Attended the second Düsseldorf Te**is Cancer Symposium, organized by our former lab member Prof. Dr. Daniel Nettersheim. Very interesting but also fun, and nice to network with the community. Big thanks to Daniel for organizing and the invite.

14/02/2024

Attending the Rosenmontagszug in Bonn, motto was "Siegfried and the Dragon" in order to raise awareness to donate blood. All had great fun!

06/12/2023

Very pleased to see that a video from our latest paper in eLife about Cylicins by Schneider, Kovacevic et al. is featured on an MRC website called biomedical Image of the day.

28/11/2023

Today our latest paper came out in eLife. It’s about Cylicins which we found to be essential for s***m structural integrity in mice. Together with our colleagues in Münster, we were able to identify ai infertile patient with variations in these genes. This demonstrates, that our model is perfectly suited to look into the complex biology of s***m structural protein interactions. Congratulations to all contributors and especially the two co-first authors Simon Schneider and Andjela Kovacevic from our lab.

Cylicin 1 and Cylicin 2 are essential components of the s***m perinuclear theca and their loss results in impaired s***miogenesis and thus in infertility in mice and men.