Eunju Jenny Shin

Biography

Dr Eunju Jenny Shin completed her BSc in Biological Sciences at Ajou University, South Korea in 2003, achieving the top graduate position within the Natural Science College. She then moved to the UK with the award of Chevening Scholarship from the British Council to study Molecular Pharmacology (MSc) at the University of Manchester, researching cortical interneuron development in foetal brain (Trinh et al., 2006, European Journal of Neuroscience). She continued investigating on development of neurons during her PhD training, differentiating mouse embryonic stem cells into medium spiny neurons to be used in cell replacement therapy in Huntington’s disease (Shin et al., 2012, Stem Cell Reviews and Reports). This was performed in Prof. Rosemary Fricker’s lab at Keele University from 2005 to 2009. She then had a slight change of research field (from Huntington’s disease to Parkinson’s disease) and skillsets (more in vivo) during her postdoctoral training.

Following her PhD supervisor’s footsteps, she went to the world-renowned Prof. Anders Björklund’s lab in Lund University, Sweden who pioneered cell replacement therapy for Parkinson’s disease. Dr Shin worked on finding mechanisms underlying devastating graft-induced dyskinesia (uncontrolled movement) following cell transplantation in Parkinson’s patients (Shin et al., 2012, Neurobiology of Disease), a role of noradrenergic neurons in motor impairments and development of L-DOPA-induced dyskinesia in Parkinson’s disease (Shin et al., 2014, Experimental Neurology), and α-Synuclein induced toxicity in brain stem serotonin neurons (Wan*, Shin* et al., 2016, Scientific Reports).

She then moved back to the UK in 2014, starting to study neurodevelopmental mechanisms in schizophrenia (SZ). She started to use human pluripotent stem cells (hPSCs), genome engineering and directed differentiation towards cortical excitatory and inhibitory neurons. This was initiated during her second postdoctoral period at Cardiff University and continued on in her first independent lab at the Neuroscience and Mental Health Research Institute, Cardiff University. Her lab further utilised the most up-to-date research tools such as single cell RNA sequencing, single cell qRT-PCR and high-content screening such as CellInsight CX7.

The most recent research output from her lab is available at Nature Communications. This research is the first time that genetic disruption of specific cell processes crucial to brain development has been linked to disease risk in a wide range of psychiatric disorders, sketching the foundations for an integrated aetiological model of psychiatric genetic disorders and their developmental origins.

Since Dec 2021, Dr Shin is at Keele University as a lecturer in Neuroscience, aiming to further identify fundamental principles in cortical neuron development and processes altered in neurodevelopmental and neuropsychiatric disorders leading to novel drug target identification and patient treatment response prediction. Her research utilises a wide range of techniques such as human pluripotent stem cell differentiation, CRISPR interference, single cell transcriptomics, proteomics, genetic analyses and various in vitro cellular assays.

Research and scholarship

Research vision

To understand embryonic cortical neurogenesis, unravelling the cellular processes contributing to cell fate determination and functional maturation. Further, to use this knowledge 1) to identify biological processes contributing to neurodevelopmental disorders such as autism spectrum disorder and schizophrenia, 2) predict patient’s treatment response and 3) to reveal novel drug targets.

Specific research questions driving current and future work

1. Which genetic factors determine adult neuronal cell types during cortical neuron development?
2. Which cellular pathways in which neurodevelopmental cell types contribute to neurodevelopmental disorders such as autism spectrum disorder and schizophrenia?
3. Can we identify modifiable targets driving such pathways and rescue cellular phenotypes implicated in disease?
4. Can neurodevelopmental phenotypes in patient-derived neurons be used to predict treatment response?

My work employs neuronal differentiation from human pluripotent stem cells (hPSCs), disease modelling in genome-engineered hPSCs, direct neuronal conversion from patient tissue, and scalable phenotyping approaches (e.g. single cell RNA sequencing and live cell imaging). These are tightly integrated with bioinformatic and disease genetic analyses.

We welcome enthusiastic individuals who are interested in the above research questions and tools. Please contact me via e-mail if you would like to want to know more or join us.

Teaching

Current Teaching

• LSC-30039 Regeneration and Repair in the Nervous System
• LSC-30042 Current Research Topics in Neuroscience
• Developing a new master’s programme (MRes in Neuroscience) at the School of Life Sciences, Keele University

Past Teaching

Further information

Professional Membership and invited positions

• 2021-Present Ajou Global Fellow by Ajou University, South Korea
• 2021-Present Review editor for Frontiers in Neuroscience
• 2020-Present International Society of Psychiatric Genetics member
• 2019-Present NECTAR (Network for European CNS Transplantation and Restoration) board member
• 2017-Present British Neuroscience Association member
• 2015-Present International Society for Stem Cell Research member
• 2014-Present British Society for Developmental Biology member
• 2008-Present Physiological Society member
• 2008-Present Network of CNS Transplantation and Restoration member
• 2008-Present Society for Neuroscience member

Invited talks and oral presentations

Further information

• ORCID: 0000-0002-8865-6834
• Google Scholar: https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=El2Z-oUAAAAJ&hl=en

Supervision

Please e-mail me if you are interested in joining my research team.

Line manager for research assistants, Cardiff University

• Oct 2019 – Feb 2021 Bret Sanders, funded by Wellcome Trust ISSF Using surface acoustic waves to efficiently generate pure neuronal populations from stem cells to generate insight into human brain disorders.
• Mar 2020 – Oct 2020 Fangda Wu, funded by Wellcome Trust ISSF Using surface acoustic waves to efficiently generate pure neuronal populations from stem cells to generate insight into human brain disorders

Primary supervisor for PhD students, Cardiff University

• Oct 2016 – Jan 2021 Bret Sanders, funded by NMHRI lecturer start-up grant and DEFINE (Wellcome Trust Strategic Award) Thesis: Studying human neuropsychiatric disease in DLG2 deficient neurons Awarded: Jan 2021
• Jan 2018 – Mar 2022 Asmaa Ghazwani, funded by Royal Embassy of Saudi Arabia PhD studentship Thesis: Schizophrenia risk gene DLG2 contributes to cortical interneuron development, expected submission date: 31/03/2022 with COVID19 extension

Co-supervisor

• Oct 2017- Dec 2021 Karima Azzouni, funded by MRC 4-year PhD programme and Waterloo Foundation, School of Medicine, DPMCN, Cardiff University Thesis: Generation of MGE-like interneurons from human pluripotent stem cells, submission date: 15/12/2021 with COVID19 extension.
• Oct 2019 – Sep 2022 Benjamin Clennell, funded by MRC GW4 BioMed Doctoral Training Partnership Bristol Medical School, The University of Bristol Thesis: Ultrasonic stimulation to probe the synaptic properties of human stem cell-derived cortical neurons, expected submission date: 30/9/2022

Primary superior for Masters students

Feb 2020 - Sept 2020 Matthew Lloyd, MRes in Stem Cell Neurobiology, Cardiff University. Thesis: Investigating the neurodevelopmental contribution of risk variants DLG2 and TCF4 to schizophrenia aetiology

Jan 2016 - Sep 2016 Gareth Chapman, MRes in Biosciences, Cardiff University. Thesis: Determining the temporal expression of DLG2 during early human neural development

Oct 2011 - June 2012 James Rogers, Wallenberg Neuroscience Centre, Lund university, Sweden. Thesis: The role of noradrenaline in motor symptoms and L-DOPA-induced dyskinesia in rat models of Parkinson’s disease

Hosted undergraduates and visiting fellow

Collaborations and grants awards

Key collaborators

• Dr Daniel D’Andrea, Bioinformatics, School of Medicine, Cardiff University
• Prof Derek Blake, Functional genomics and Psychiatric Genetics, School of Medicine, Cardiff University
• Dr Mark O. Collins, Proteomics/phosphoproteomics, Deputy Director of Mass Spectrometry Centre, University of Sheffield
• Dr Daniel Whitcomb, Synapse electrophysiology, Bristol Medical School, University of Bristol

Awards and grants