Aaron Ciechanover, MD, Dsc
Professor, Visiting

Medical School: “Hadassah” and the Hebrew University School of Medicine, Jerusalem, Israel

Internship/Residency: "Rambam" University Medical Center, and the Faculty of Medicine, Technion-Israel Institute of Technology, Haifa, Israel

Graduate School: Technion-Israel Inst. of Tech., Haifa, Israel

Post-Doctoral Fellowship: Department of Biology, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (M.I.T.) and The Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research, Cambridge, MA

Aaron Ciechanover, MD, DSc, who is a Research Professor of Biochemistry at the Technion - Israel Institute of Technology, has served as a Visiting Professor in the Division of Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine at Northwestern since 2003.  Dr. Ciechanover is one of the discoverers of the critically important ubiquitin-proteasome pathway, through which proteins undergo regulated degradation and recycling in cells.  Ubiquitin-mediated degradation of proteins is central to the regulation of basic cellular processes, including the cell cycle, transcriptional activation, growth and development, differentiation, apoptosis, receptor modulation and DNA repair.  For his seminal work in elucidating the ubiquitin-proteasome pathway, Dr. Ciechanover, along with Drs. Avram Hershko and Irwin Rose, was awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 2004.  Dr. Ciechanover is currently collaborating with other researchers in the Division of Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine on studies examining the role of ubiquitin-mediated degradation of key proteins in alveolar epithelial cells as determinants of acute lung injury.

For more information about Dr. Ciechanover and the 2004 Nobel Prize in Chemistry, please visit http://nobelprize.org/chemistry/laureates/2004/

Selected Recent Publications:

Ciechanover A, Schwartz AL.
The ubiquitin system: pathogenesis of human diseases and drug targeting.
Biochim Biophys Acta. 2004 Nov 29;1695(1-3):3-17.
PMID: 15571805 [PubMed - in process]

Ben-Saadon R, Fajerman I, Ziv T, Hellman U, Schwartz AL, Ciechanover A.
The tumor suppressor protein p16(INK4a) and the human papillomavirus
oncoprotein-58 E7 are naturally occurring lysine-less proteins that are degraded by the ubiquitin system. Direct evidence for ubiquitination at the N-terminalresidue.
J Biol Chem. 2004 Oct 1;279(40):41414-21. Epub 2004 Jul 14.
PMID: 15254040 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]

Ciechanover A, Iwai K.
The ubiquitin system: from basic mechanisms to the patient bed.
IUBMB Life. 2004 Apr;56(4):193-201. Review.
PMID: 15230346 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]

Lahav-Baratz S, Ben-Izhak O, Sabo E, Ben-Eliezer S, Lavie O, Ishai D,
Ciechanover A, Dirnfeld M.
Decreased level of the cell cycle regulator p27 and increased level of its ubiquitin ligase Skp2 in endometrial carcinoma but not in normal secretory or in hyperstimulated endometrium.
Mol Hum Reprod. 2004 Aug;10(8):567-72. Epub 2004 Jun 25.
PMID: 15220466 [PubMed - in process]

Trausch-Azar JS, Lingbeck J, Ciechanover A, Schwartz AL.
Ubiquitin-Proteasome-mediated degradation of Id1 is modulated by MyoD.
J Biol Chem. 2004 Jul 30;279(31):32614-9. Epub 2004 May 25.
PMID: 15163661 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]

Sun XM, Butterworth M, MacFarlane M, Dubiel W, Ciechanover A, Cohen GM.
Caspase activation inhibits proteasome function during apoptosis.
Mol Cell. 2004 Apr 9;14(1):81-93.
PMID: 15068805 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]

Finley D, Ciechanover A, Varshavsky A.
Ubiquitin as a central cellular regulator.
Cell. 2004 Jan 23;116(2 Suppl):S29-32, 2 p following S32. No abstract available.
PMID: 15055578 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]

Ciechanover A, Ben-Saadon R.
N-terminal ubiquitination: more protein substrates join in.
Trends Cell Biol. 2004 Mar;14(3):103-6. Review.
PMID: 15055197 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]

Fajerman I, Schwartz AL, Ciechanover A.
Degradation of the Id2 developmental regulator: targeting via N-terminal
ubiquitination.
Biochem Biophys Res Commun. 2004 Feb 6;314(2):505-12.
PMID: 14733935 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]

Herrmann J, Ciechanover A, Lerman LO, Lerman A.
The ubiquitin-proteasome system in cardiovascular diseases-a hypothesis
extended.
Cardiovasc Res. 2004 Jan 1;61(1):11-21. Review. Erratum in: Cardiovasc Res. 2004 Sep 1;63(4):756.
PMID: 14732197 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]