Dr Courtney Hanna

Pregnancy complications affect as many as one in four pregnancies, yet there remains a critical gap in our knowledge of their underlying aetiologies, resulting in a lack of clinical tools to improve outcomes. As the maternal-foetal interface, the placenta is essential for healthy pregnancy, with poor function and molecular defects being strongly associated with pregnancy complications. However, there is little mechanistic understanding of the molecular events regulating placental development. My laboratory investigates mechanisms of gene regulation in placental trophoblast, revealing how these underpin the development of a functional placenta. Using a combination of genetic tools and cutting-edge ultra-low input and single-cell sequencing methodologies, our work examines the features of early epigenetic programming in placental trophoblast and demonstrates how epigenetic marks are critical for setting up gene regulatory landscapes during placental differentiation.

Research collaborators

Dr Miguel Constancia, Dept Obstetrics & Gynaecology, University of Cambridge
Dr Naomi McGovern, Dept Pathology, University of Cambridge
Dr Vicente Perez-Garcia, Centro de Investigación Príncipe Felipe, Valencia, Spain