Bon-kyoung Koo MS, PhD

Dr. Bon-Kyoung Koo, MS, Ph.D. is a Group Leader at the IMBA - Institute of Molecular Biotechnology. He completed his Doctor of Philosophy at the Master of Science at the Pohang University of Science and Technology. His Clinical interests are WNT Signaling, Genetics, Cancer Biology, Stem Cell Biology, Organoids, Adult Stem Cells, Confocal Microscopy, Biotechnology, Western Blotting, and Immunohistochemistry. Dr. Bon-Kyoung Koo is an experienced mouse geneticist actively employing the emerging organoid culture technology to study stem cell maintenance and activation in mouse and human intestinal and stomach organoid cultures. Following his Ph.D. and first post-doctoral studies in the laboratory of Prof. Young-Yun Kong at POSTECH – Republic of Korea, Dr. Koo joined the group of Prof. Hans Clevers at the Hubrecht Institute, KNAW, Netherlands. Here he witnessed the first establishment of the Lgr5+ cell-derived intestinal organoid culture system pioneered by Dr. Toshiro Sato and Prof. Hans Clevers. In the following years, Dr. Koo utilized this novel culture system to perform sophisticated gene correction studies, to unravel the molecular regulation of adult stem cells, and to prove the stem cell properties of a Troy+, quiescent reserve stem cell population in the stomach. Together with his group at the University of Cambridge he is now developing novel genetic tools to further investigate how proliferating and quiescent adult epithelial stem cell populations are regulated both in homeostasis and during the injury-mediated repair.