Ionel Sandovici
Research Associate
“It’s not only the genes that make us”
At leisure, I enjoy meeting friends, jogging, reading and traveling.
Research interests
- The role of imprinted genes in development and metabolism
- Early-life epigenetic programming of adult diseases
Proliferation of endothelial cells in E16 mouse placenta: CD31/PECAM1 (red) marks endothelial cells, EdU (green) marks proliferating cells, DAPI (blue) 
CD31/PECAM1 IHC marking endothelial cells in E19 mouse placenta
Publications
Highlighted:~
• Hammerle CM, Sandovici I, Brierley GV, Smith NM, Zimmer WE, Zvetkova I, Prosser HM, Sekita Y, Lam BYH, Ma M, Cooper WN, Vidal-Puig A, Ozanne SE, Medina-Gómez G, Constância M (2020). Mesenchyme-derived IGF2 is a major paracrine regulator of pancreatic growth and function. PLoS Genet. 16: e1009069.
• Ziegler AN, Feng Q, Chidambaram S, Testai JM, Kumari E, Rothbard DE, Constancia M, Sandovici I, Cominski T, Pang K, Gao N, Wood TL, Levison SW (2019). Insulin-like Growth Factor II: An Essential Adult Stem Cell Niche Constituent in Brain and Intestine. Stem Cell Reports 12: 816-830.
• Sandovici I, Hammerle CM, Cooper WN, Smith NH, Tarry-Adkins JL, Dunmore BJ, Bauer J, Andrews SR, Yeo GS, Ozanne SE, Constância M (2016). Ageing is associated with molecular signatures of inflammation and type 2 diabetes in rat pancreatic islets. Diabetologia 59: 502-511.
• Ferrón SR, Radford EJ, Domingo-Muelas A, Kleine I, Ramme A, Gray D, Sandovici I, Constancia M, Ward A, Menheniott TR, Ferguson-Smith AC (2015). Differential genomic imprinting regulates paracrine and autocrine roles of IGF2 in mouse adult neurogenesis. Nat. Commun. 6: 8265.
• Sandovici I, Hoelle K, Angiolini E & Constancia M (2012). Placental adaptations to the maternal-fetal environment: implications for fetal growth and developmental programming. RBM online. 25: 68-89.
• Sandovici I, Smith NH, Nitert MD, Ackers-Johnson M, Uribe-Lewis S, Ito Y, Jones RH, Marquez VE, Cairns W, Tadayyon M, O’Neill LP, Murrell A, Ling C, Constancia M & Ozanne SE (2011). Maternal diet and aging alter the epigenetic control of a promoter-enhancer interaction at the Hnf4a gene in rat pancreatic islets. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U. S. A. 108: 5449-5454
Research summary
I am currently employed by the University of Cambridge at the Department of Obstetrics and Gynaecology and at the Wellcome-MRC Institute of Metabolic Science- Metabolic Research Laboratories (IMS-MRL), as a Research Associate.
My projects are funded by a strategic partnership between Wellcome and the Medical Research Council. I study tissue-specific actions of imprinted
genes (such as Igf2 – insulin-like growth factor type 2 and miR-483) during development as well as their roles in metabolism.
I also study the impact of sub-optimal diet during critical periods of development on epigenetic regulation of gene expression (particularly on altering promoter-enhancer interactions), with consequences for higher risk of metabolic diseases such as type 2 diabetes and obesity in later life.
Location
University Department of Obstetrics & Gynaecology, Level 4 labs, Addenbrookes Hospital
Phone: +44 (0)1223 (3)36783 (lab) or (7)63890 office