Premium Beauty News - You are a scientist by training, a graduate of the École Normale Supérieure of Lyon in molecular biology and genetics, you were a researcher at the CEA of Évry, what triggered your interest in skin, the epidermis, differentiation and stress?
Jérôme Lamartine - Indeed I am a scientist by training and not a dermatologist. In 2005 before joining the centre of Genetics and Molecular and Cellular Physiology of the CNRS in Lyon, I took part in research projects aimed at understanding cellular mechanisms through their gene expression. I started exploring this topic through a thesis I conducted at the International Agency for Research on Cancer in Lyon by studying genes involved in genetic diseases of the immune system. Then I was recruited at the Généthon in Évry to work on the identification of genes responsible for rare skin diseases such as ectodermal dysplasias that result in particular in hair formation defects at both the skin and hair level. So it is through genetic diseases that I started to get involved in skin. These works were followed a few years later at the CEA of Évry by studying, through the use high-throughput analysis approaches, the effects of radiation, such as ionizing radiations on the skin. These technologies, like microarrays or high-throughput sequencing, allow approaching the cell as a whole. The cell is very complex with millions of biological objects and these methods of investigation enable to have a comprehensive view of phenomena.
Currently, with my team at the CNRS in Lyon, we are focusing on genotoxic stress [1], on its impact on skin homeostasis and on the occurrence of skin diseases such as cancers. We are trying to understand how a cell enters into a differentiation program, what are the molecular mechanisms involved and how this program is disturbed as a result of genotoxic stress.
Premium Beauty News - What are your latest advancements in this area?
Jérôme Lamartine - Recently, we have demonstrated the role played by transcription factors particularly those that occur at a critical moment for the epidermal cell: when it stops dividing and starts to differentiate. We have shown that the same regulators act during normal differentiation and during a response to stress.
For example, an important player that we discovered is the transcription factor GATA-3 [2]. This molecule not only plays a part in the formation of the hair follicle but it is also present to regulate the genes response to gamma irradiation at the epidermis level. The GATA-3 is involved in stopping cell proliferation and in its entry into differentiation. Our work aims to highlight the link between stress and differentiation through the molecular players involved in these phenomena. Aging is part of our research. Sun exposure is a stressor for the skin who will respond by accelerating its differentiation, through the modification of some genetic networks. We are trying to understand how to protect the skin from genotoxic stress, or even how to reverse the differentiation and aging process.
Premium Beauty News - Your team is also involved in the study of skin cancers. Very recently, the work of one of your researchers, Miss Manale El Kharbili, were awarded the 2012 SPIM Junior Scientist Prize, can tell you us more on their content?
Jérôme Lamartine - Concerning skin cancers and in particular melanoma, we use methods of global gene expression analysis to understand why a melanoma is invasive or not. The work of Manale El Kharbili [3] has evidenced that a membrane protein, the Tetraspanin 8 is highly expressed in invasive cells and totally absent in others. This molecule seems therefore to be an interesting candidate to use as a diagnostic tool on this subject or as a therapeutic target.
Regarding these subjects, molecular players involved are investigated by us the same way.
Premium Beauty News - The city of Lyon appears as being an active pole for dermocosmetics, with whom do you collaborate?
Jérôme Lamartine - As we only do basic research, cosmetic manufacturers are not for the time being our main partners even if our subjects are of interest to them. However, we will be signing this year a collaboration agreement with a player operating in this field. We interact with research laboratories, like for example the team of Odile Damour or with colleagues fom the IBCP (Institute of Biology and Protein Chemistry).Moreover, as a teacher at the University Lyon 1 and a member of a committee which is interested in the links between the academic world and the industry, I am in contact with the European Centre of dermocosmetology (CED).
Premium Beauty News - Finally, how do you see the future of the cell, you who are observing it in a global manner?
Jérôme Lamartine - biology in my opinion is undergoing the same changes as physics did between the beginning of the 20th century and today. From experimental science, we are gradually shifting to a science of modelling. Yet, what is true for physics is not true for biology but I think the future stands in the gathering of knowledge with the hope of one day being able to model the cell.
Another trend, which is starting to emerge, in my opinion, is the ultra customization of products and medicine. It is already possible to obtain many biological data on an individual and tomorrow for just a few hundred euros, its entire genome will be accessible. This information could be stored on individual smart cards that could be consulted to develop medical treatments or customized cosmetics.
These changes can be summarized in three words: globalization of analysis, customization, modelling.
