Scientific Personnel

Brief Bio

Dr. Kenneth B. Marcu earned his B.S. degree in Biological Sciences in 1972 and subsequently his Ph.D. in Molecular Biology in 1975 both from the State University of New York at Stony Brook, Stony Brook, NY USA.  From 1975-1978 he trained as a NIH Postdoctoral Fellow in the laboratory of Dr. Robert P. Perry at the Institute for Cancer Research, Philadelphia, NY. on mechanisms of immunoglobulin mRNA processing and also worked together with Drs. Oliver Smithies and Frederic Blattner at the Univ. of Wisconsin, Madison, WI on the first cloning of immunoglobulin heavy chain genes.  In 1978, Dr. Marcu was appointed Assistant Professor in the Department of Biochemistry and Cell Biology at Stony Brook University and in 1983 was promoted to Associate Professor with Tenure and in 1988 to Full Professor of Biochemistry and Cell Biology, Microbiology and Pathology. He was also a member of the Basel Institute for Immunology, Basel, Switzerland from 1983-84 and was a Visiting Professor at the Faculty des Sciences, University of Nice from 1994-96.  Since 2002, Dr. Marcu is also an Adjunct Professor at the University of Bologna, Bologna, Italy and a Senior Visiting Scientist at the Rizzoli Orthopedic Institute, Bologna, Italy.  Prof. Marcu is a molecular biologist and immunologist with extensive experience in all aspects of gene regulation in higher eukaryotic cells and knowledge of both innate and adaptive immune responses.

Honors and Awards
1975-1978      NIH Postdoctoral Fellowship
1981-1986      NIH Research Career Development Award
1983               Outstanding Alumnus SUNY at Stony Brook
1987               Catacosinos Cancer Research Professor
1994-1995      Poste Orange de L'INSERM Francais
1996               Professeur de L'Institute Universitaire de France (Versailles)
2003-06          Senior Scholar of the Institute for Advanced Studies (Univ. of Bologna)

Other Professional Activities
1985-1989     American Cancer Society Advisory Committee on Proteins and Nucleic Acids
1991-1994    American Cancer Society Advisory Committee on Immunology & Immunotherapy
1991-1995    NIH Allergy/Immunology Study Section
1994-1998    Consultant for McKeen Garnett Inc.
1997-1999     Member Scientific Advisory Board of Small Molecule Theraeputics
2000-2004     Consultant for Boehringer Ingelheim Corporation
2003-2008     Scientific consultant, DIBIT, Istituto Scientifico H San Raffaele
2003-2008     Member of EU Network of Excellence  (MAIN:  Migration and Inflammation)
2014-present:  Member Scientific Advisory Board Genome & Stem Cell Center Erciyes University, Kayseri, Turkey

Major Scientific Contributions
Dr. Marcu has made pioneering and seminal contributions in the elucidation of the molecular requirements and regulation of immunoglobulin heavy chain gene switch recombination, on the mechanisms of activation and function of the c-Myc oncogene in lymphoid malignancies and on the regulation and mechanisms of action of the inhibitor of NF-kappaB activating kinases IKKalpha and IKKbeta.

 

Selected Publications

Marcu, K.B., Schibler, U. and Perry, R.P. (1979). The Nuclear Transcripts of Mouse Heavy Chain Immunoglobulin Contain Only the Expressed Class of C-region Sequences.  Science 241, 1087-1088.

Marcu, K.B., Banerji, J., Penncavage, N., Lang, R. and Arnheim, N. (1980). The 5' Flanking Region of Immunoglobulin Heavy Chain Constant Region Genes Displays Length Heterogeneity in the Germ Lines of Inbred Mouse Strains.  Cell 22, 187-196.

Harris, L.J., Lang, R.B. and Marcu, K.B. (1982). Non-immunoglobulin Associated DNA Rearrangements in Mouse Plasmacytomas.  Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 79, 4175-4179.

Marcu, K.B., Harris, L.J., Stanton, L.W., Erikson, Watt, J. R. and Croce, C.M. (1983). Transcriptionally Active c-myc Oncogene is Contained Within NIARD, a DNA Sequence Associated With Chromosome Translocations in B Cell Neoplasia.  Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci.  USA 80, 519-523.

Stanton, L.W., Watt, R. and Marcu, K.B. (1983). Translocation, Breakage and Truncated Transcripts of the c-myc Oncogene in Murine Plasmacytomas.  Nature 303, 401-406.

Piechaczyk, M., Yang, J.Q., Blanchard, J., Jeanteur, Ph. and Marcu, K.B. (1985). Post-Transcriptional Mechanisms are Responsible for
Accumulation of Truncated c-myc RNAs in Murine Plasma Cell Tumors.  Cell 42, 589-597.

Nepveu, A. and Marcu, K.B. (1986). Intragenic Pausing and Anti-sense Transcription Within the Murine c-myc Locus.  EMBO J. 5, 2859-2865.

Li, X., Massa, P., Hanidu, A., Peet, G.W., Aro, P., Savitt, A., Mische, S. Li, J. and  Marcu, K.B. (2002) IKKα, IKKβ and NEMO/IKKγ are each required for the NF-B mediated inflammatory response program. J. Biol. Chem. 277: 45129-45140.

Olivotto, E., Borzi', R.M., Vitellozzi, R., Pagani, S., Facchini, A., Battistelli, M., Penzo, M., Li, X., Flamigni, F., Li, J., Falcieri, E., Facchini, A.,  and Marcu, K.B. (2008) Differential requirements for IKKα and IKKβ in the differentiation of primary human osteoarthritic chondrocytes.  Arthritis and Rheumatism 58: 227-239.
 

Penzo, M., Molteni, R., Suda, T., Samaniego, S., Raucci, A., Habiel, D.M., Miller, F., Jiang, H-P., Li, J.., Pardi, R., Palumbo, R., Olivotto, E., Kew, R.R., Bianchi, M. and Marcu, K.B. (2010). Inhibitor of NF-{kappa}B Kinases {alpha} and {beta} are both essential for High Mobility Group Box 1-mediated chemotaxis. J. of Immunol 184 (8): 4497-4509.
 

Kew, R.R., Penzo. M., Habiel, D. M. and Marcu, K. B. (2012) The -dependent NF-B p52/RelB non-canonical pathway is essential to sustain a CXCL12 autocrine loop in cells migrating in response to HMGB1. Journal of Immunology 188 (5): 2380-2386.

Olivotto, E., Miguel Otero, M., Astolfi, A. Platano, D., Facchini, A. Pagani, S., Flamigni, F., Facchini, A., Goldring, M.B., Borzì, R.M., and Marcu, K.B. (2013). IKKalpha/CHUK regulates extracellular matrix remodeling independent of its kinase activity to facilitate articular chondrocyte differentiation. PLOS ONE 8(9): e73024.

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