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POSTECH Life Science

KOR

Faculty

Professor
Tae Kyung Kim

LIFE SCIENCES

Tae Kyung Kim Professor

Neuroscience

ㆍLab
Lab. of Neuroepigenetics
ㆍDetail research field
Epigenomics of brain disorders, Functional dissection and precise manipulation of neural circuits
ㆍPhone
+82-54-279-2293
ㆍE-mail
tkkim@postech.ac.kr
ㆍHomepage
http://www.nepilab.com/

Research introduction

My lab is interested in understanding how sensory experience can be accurately translated into neuronal and behavioral plasticity through genetic and epigenetic regulation. Sensory experience-evoked neural activity plays essential roles in brain development and cognition, not only by instructing structural and functional changes in individual synapses, but also by triggering various calcium-dependent signaling cascades which ultimately lead to the activation of specific gene expression programs in the nucleus. This activity-induced nuclear gene expression is the cell-wide adaptation mechanism that permits the synaptic and behavioral plasticity to be long lasting. The function of activity-dependent gene regulation is especially well established for learning and memory.
Many key players in these programs have been implicated in several human neurological disorders such as Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD), Epilepsy, and Schizophrenia. Our overarching goal is to advance our understanding of the pathophysiology of various neurological disorders by defining new regulatory mechanisms and molecular players in genetic and epigenetic regulatory networks in the brain.

Research Area

  • Functional characterization of long non-coding RNAs
  • Epigenetic regulation in the brain and cognitive diseases
  • Functional characterization of cis-regulatory DNA elements
  • Role of nuclear gene expression in synaptic and behavioral plasticity
  • Functional genomics and single cell approaches to understand gene regulatory network in the brain

Major publications

  • Kim S-K, et al., Tae-Kyung Kim. Functional coordination of BET family proteins underlies altered transcription associated with memory impairment in Fragile X syndrome. Sci Adv. 2021 May;7(21)
  • Gorbovytska V., et al., Tae-Kyung Kim*, and Claus-D. Kuhn* (co-corresponding). Enhancer RNAs stimulate Pol II pause release by harnessing multivalent interactions to NELF. Nat. Comm. 2022 May 4;13(1):2429
  • Schaukowitch K, et al., Kim TK. An Intrinsic Transcriptional Program Underlying Synaptic Scaling during Activity Suppression. Cell Rep 2017
  • Joo JY, et al., Kim TK. Stimulus-specific combinatorial functionality of neuronal c-fos enhancers. Nat. Neurosci. 2016
  • Kim TK, Shiekhattar R. Architectural and Functional Commonalities between Enhancers and Promoters. Cell 2015
  • Schaukowitch K, et al., Kim TK. Enhancer RNA Facilitates NELF Release from Immediate Early Genes. Mol. Cell 2014
  • Koike N, et al., Kim TK, Takahashi JS. Transcriptional Architecture and Chromatin Landscape of the Core Circadian Clock in Mammals. Science (Article) 2012
  • Kim TK, et al., Greenberg ME. Widespread transcription at neuronal activity-regulated enhancers. Nature (Article) 2010

Education

  • B.S., Korea University, Seoul, Korea (1993)
  • Ph.D., Rutgers University- Robert Wood Johnson Medical School (2000)

Career

  • 2001-2002 : Postdoctoral Fellow, Rutgers University - Robert Wood Johnson Medical School
  • 2002-2009 : Postdoctoral Fellow, Department of Neurobiology, Harvard Medical School
  • 2010-2017 : Assistant Professor, Department of Neurosciences, UT Southwestern Medical Center (endowed title: Distinguished Scholar in Neuroscience)
  • 2017-2018 : Associated Professor with Tenure, Department of Neurosciences, UT Southwestern Medical Center
  • 2018-2021 : Associate Professor with Tenure, Department of Life Sciences, POSTECH
  • 2022-Present : Professor, Department of Life Sciences, POSTECH

Major Awards/Honors

  • 2002 : Lefler postdoctoral fellowship, Harvard Medical School
  • 2003 : Jane Coffin Childs Memorial Fund for Medical Research
  • 2010 : Reagent Scholar, UT Southwestern Medical Center
  • 2012 : The Welch Foundation
  • 2012 : The Klingenstein Fellowship Award
  • 2012 : Association of Korean Neuroscientists (AKN) junior faculty award
  • 2014 : BRAIN EAGER Award (co-Pl), National Science Foundation
  • 2018 : SFARI Pilot award (co-Pl), Simons Foundation
  • 2023 : The Korean Society for Integrative Biology Excellence in Science Award

Research Image

Tae Kyung Kim_Research image

Tae Kyung Kim_Research image

Research Youtube

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