Natasha Chang

Dr. Natasha Chang

Working Group Member

Assistant Professor, Department of Biochemistry, McGill University


NMD4C Involvement: Pillar 1: Preclinical Science, Theme 1: Early-Career, Theme 5: Open Science

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Research Interests: Muscle stem cells, Muscle regeneration, Myogenesis, Duchenne muscular dystrophy

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Biography

Dr. Natasha Chang is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Biochemistry at McGill University. She obtained her PhD with Dr. Gordon Shore at McGill University studying BCL-2 family proteins and their role in regulating the cell survival autophagy pathway. Her studies highlighted a critical role for basal autophagy in the maintenance of skeletal muscle homeostasis. Dr. Chang performed her postdoctoral training in the laboratory of Dr. Michael Rudnicki at the Sprott Centre for Stem Cell Research at the Ottawa Hospital Research Institute. During her postdoctoral fellowship she made seminal contributions establishing the role of the dystrophin glycoprotein complex in regulating muscle stem cell fate. Importantly, she demonstrated that dystrophin deficiency in muscle stem cells leads to altered epigenetic gene regulation in the mdx mouse model of Duchenne muscular dystrophy. Dr. Chang’s research program at McGill investigates the molecular regulation of muscle stem cell biology in healthy and degenerative contexts with a focus on how cellular autophagy mediates muscle stem cell functions.

Read Dr. Chang’s Early Career Blog here!


Recent Publications

VanGenderen, CA, Granet, JA, Filippelli, RL, Liu, Y, Chang, NC. Modulating Myogenesis: An Optimized In Vitro Assay to Pharmacologically Influence Primary Myoblast Differentiation. Curr Protoc. 2022.2 (9)e565 PMID:36165685

Filippelli, RL, Kamyabiazar, S, Chang, NC. Monitoring Autophagy in Neural Stem and Progenitor Cells. Methods Mol Biol. 2022.2515 99-116 PMID:35776348

Filippelli, RL, Omer, A, Li, S, van Oostende-Triplet, C, Gallouzi, IE, Chang, NC et al.. Automated Quantification of Subcellular Particles in Myogenic Progenitors. Curr Protoc. 2021.1 (12)e325 PMID:34879178

Filippelli, RL, Chang, NC. Empowering Muscle Stem Cells for the Treatment of Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy. Cells Tissues Organs. 2022.211 (6)641-654 PMID:33910206

Chang, NC. Autophagy and Stem Cells: Self-Eating for Self-Renewal. Front Cell Dev Biol. 2020.8 138 PMID:32195258

Chang, NC, Sincennes, MC, Chevalier, FP, Brun, CE, Lacaria, M, Segalés, J et al.. The Dystrophin Glycoprotein Complex Regulates the Epigenetic Activation of Muscle Stem Cell Commitment. Cell Stem Cell. 2018.22 (5)755-768.e6 PMID:29681515

Pasut, A, Chang, NC, Gurriaran-Rodriguez, U, Faulkes, S, Yin, H, Lacaria, M et al.. Notch Signaling Rescues Loss of Satellite Cells Lacking Pax7 and Promotes Brown Adipogenic Differentiation. Cell Rep. 2016.16 (2)333-343 PMID:27346341

Chang, NC, Chevalier, FP, Rudnicki, MA. Satellite Cells in Muscular Dystrophy - Lost in Polarity. Trends Mol Med. 2016.22 (6)479-496 PMID:27161598

Jahani-Asl, A, Yin, H, Soleimani, VD, Haque, T, Luchman, HA, Chang, NC et al.. Control of glioblastoma tumorigenesis by feed-forward cytokine signaling. Nat Neurosci. 2016.19 (6)798-806 PMID:27110918

Dick, SA, Chang, NC, Dumont, NA, Bell, RA, Putinski, C, Kawabe, Y et al.. Caspase 3 cleavage of Pax7 inhibits self-renewal of satellite cells. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 2015.112 (38)E5246-52 PMID:26372956

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