Katarzyna Kwiatkowska

Biography: Katarzyna Kwiatkowska is a professor at the Nencki Institute of Experimental Biology. She obtained her Ph.D. at the Nencki Institute and was a postdoc at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center in Helen Yin’s group, studying the activity of actin-binding proteins and the dynamics of the plasma membrane. After returning to the Nencki Institute, she joined the Laboratory of Plasma Membrane Receptors at the Nencki Institute, undertaking studies on signaling triggered by the Fcγ receptors of immune cells. She focused on the role of plasma membrane nanodomains enriched in sphingolipids and cholesterol, so-called rafts, in activation and signal transduction by these receptors leading to phagocytosis in myeloid cells.

After becoming head of the Laboratory of Molecular Membrane Biology, she leads studies on signaling triggered by receptors involved in the innate immune responses of macrophages. Her group is particularly interested in the role of lipids and protein lipidation in the signaling of CD14 and Toll-like receptor 4 activated by bacterial lipopolysaccharide.