{"id":13512,"date":"2018-05-25T15:16:43","date_gmt":"2018-05-25T13:16:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news.embl.de\/?p=13512"},"modified":"2024-03-22T23:16:49","modified_gmt":"2024-03-22T22:16:49","slug":"melina-schuh-receives-embo-gold-medal","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.embl.org\/news\/alumni\/melina-schuh-receives-embo-gold-medal\/","title":{"rendered":"Melina Schuh receives EMBO Gold Medal"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\">By Annika Grandison and Edward Dadswell<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p>Melina Schuh, EMBL alumna and a Director at the Max Planck Institute for Biophysical Chemistry in G\u00f6ttingen, Germany, has received an EMBO Gold Medal. The award is given annually to young scientists for outstanding contributions to the life sciences in Europe.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cIt is an absolute honour,\u201d says Schuh. \u201cBut the award should really go to the many outstanding postdocs and students I have had the pleasure to work with. None of our work would have been possible without their enthusiasm and dedication.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.mpibpc.mpg.de\/mschuh\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Schuh\u2019s research<\/a> focuses on mammalian egg cells, or oocytes. Her aim is to understand how they develop and why they frequently carry an incorrect number of chromosomes \u2013 a condition known as aneuploidy. This is a leading cause of pregnancy loss and of genetic disorders such as Down syndrome. She is also investigating why there is a dramatic decline in the quality of oocytes later in life. \u201cAneuploidy in eggs increases as women get older,\u201d says Schuh. \u201cThis also explains why it becomes more and more difficult for women to conceive as they approach their early forties. We want to understand the mechanisms behind the decline in egg quality with advancing maternal age.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"vf-blockquote\"><p>It is an absolute honour<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p>Schuh\u2019s path as a researcher was influenced by her studies at the University of Bayreuth, where she enjoyed using quantitative microscopy to tackle biological problems. \u201cI especially like microscopy as an approach because it can be used to observe live and in great detail how a cell works,\u201d she explains. She applied for a PhD in <a href=\"http:\/\/www.embl.de\/research\/units\/cbb\/ellenberg\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Jan Ellenberg\u2019s group<\/a> at EMBL, knowing that Ellenberg was a pioneer in live-cell imaging.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>During her time in the Ellenberg group, Schuh developed microscopy methods for imaging live oocytes from mice. Later, at the MRC Laboratory of Molecular Biology in Cambridge, UK, she extended this work to human oocytes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Schuh continues her research as a group leader at the Max Planck Institute. In the long term, she hopes her work will help people facing problems with infertility.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>EMBL alumna Melina Schuh recognised for excellence in science<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":16,"featured_media":13515,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,17593],"tags":[80,149,64,535,577,203,43,79],"embl_taxonomy":[],"class_list":["post-13512","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-alumni","category-people-perspectives","tag-alumni","tag-award","tag-cell-biology","tag-chromosome","tag-chromosome-dynamics","tag-embo","tag-heidelberg","tag-microscopy"],"acf":{"article_intro":"<p>EMBL alumna Melina Schuh recognised for excellence in science<\/p>\n","related_links":[{"link_description":"Schuh laboratory at the Max Planck Institute","link_url":"http:\/\/www.mpibpc.mpg.de\/mschuh"},{"link_description":"Melina Schuh wins 2015 John Kendrew Award","link_url":"http:\/\/news.embl.de\/alumni\/1508-kendrew-philipson\/"},{"link_description":"EMBL Alumni Awards","link_url":"https:\/\/www.embl.de\/aboutus\/alumni\/alumni-awards\/index.html"}],"article_sources":false,"vf_locked":false,"featured":false,"color":"#007B53"},"embl_taxonomy_terms":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v26.2 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Melina Schuh receives EMBO Gold Medal | EMBL<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"EMBL alumna Melina Schuh, currently a Director at the Max Planck Institute for Biophysical Chemistry in G\u00f6ttingen, Germany, has received an EMBO Gold Medal. The award is given annually to young scientists for outstanding contributions to the life sciences in Europe.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.embl.org\/news\/alumni\/melina-schuh-receives-embo-gold-medal\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Melina Schuh receives EMBO Gold Medal | EMBL\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"EMBL alumna Melina Schuh, currently a Director at the Max Planck Institute for Biophysical Chemistry in G\u00f6ttingen, Germany, has received an EMBO Gold Medal. 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