I was born in Leningrad, Soviet Union in 1951, and have received my B.Sc. in Biology/Biophysics (1971) and M.Sc. in Biochemistry (1973) from the Faculty of Biological Sciences at the Leningrad State University. After receiving my Ph.D. Degree in Molecular Biology and Cancer Biology (1979) from the Petrov Cancer Research Institute, I was continuing my research as a research scientist there. In 1983, I was accepted as a senior research scientist into a newly organized Department of Genetic Engineering at the Institute of Cytology, Leningrad, USSR. In 1990, I immigrated to Israel and started working as an Instructor at the Weizmann Institute of Science, Rehovot, Israel, where I studied the interferon type I receptor signaling at the Department of Molecular Virology under the supervision of Prof. Michel Revel, the leader in cytokine signaling. During my tenure at Weizmann, I was awarded a British Council Award to study in ICI/Zeneca Pharmaceuticals (Alderley Park, UK) allowing me to extend my expertise in yeast genetic engineering. In 1994, I was invited to join the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine (Baltimore, Maryland, USA), as an Assistant Professor of Pathology, where I have developed a strong long-lasting interest in protein-protein interaction studies in cardiovascular and cancer diseases. This approach helped me to discover a novel midkine-dependent signaling pathway, the regulatory proteins affecting the NOS2 activity/dimerization/ degradation, and finally, I have focused on the p63 transcriptional factor implicated in head and neck cancer and ectodermal dysplasia. In 2000, I was promoted to the rank of an Associate Professor of Dermatology/Otolaryngology-Head and Neck Surgery/Oncology and then later to the rank of Professor. Since then my laboratory was able to discover a molecular mechanism underlying ectodermal dysplasia via p63-dependent regulation of RNA splicing for fibroblast growth factor receptor 2, which functions as a key regulator of the epithelial-mesenchymal transition. Since 2004, I have become an Associate Director of Head and Neck Cancer Research Division at the Johns Hopkins. In the same year I have become a member of the Graduate Training Program in Cellular and Molecular Medicine at JHMI. In 2008, I have joined the Wilmer Glia Research Laboratory Collaborative Network and Sidney Kimmel Comprehensive Cancer Center and Johns Hopkins Neurofibromatosis Research Center. In 2013, I have also become an Adjunct Professor at the George Washington University (GWIN, SEAS), Washington-DC, USA. To the present date, my collaborative efforts with Drs. David Sidransky and Barry Trink (the researchers who first discovered p53 homologue p63) led to more than 40 international publications, reviews, book chapters and patents on p63 function alone. My name was included in the books "2000 Outstanding Scientists of the 21st Century", "Great Minds of the 21st Century" and "Who is Who in Medicine" (since 2005). I am a Member of the New York Academy of Sciences, International Society on Interferon and Cytokine Research, American Society for Cell Biology, American Association for Cancer Research, International Society for Cell Biology, Society for Investigative Dermatology, American Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, International Society for Stem Cell Research. I am a Member of the Executive Advlsory Board, Biotech/Medical Board, and Sustainability Board of Lifeboat Foundation, and "Task Force: Getting to know Cancer. Halifax Project". In 2014-2015, I was awarded a Distinguished Visiting Professorship by an Ecuador Prometeo Foundation and served in the Department of Human Genetics at the La Universidad Técnica Particular de Loja (UTPL), Loja, Ecuador.
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