Dr. rer. nat. Nina Hahn

Research interests

My passion is to understand the pathology of neurodegenerative diseases. I aim to identify the pathophysiological key players in order to develop corresponding therapeutic approaches. Focusing on cellular and molecular neuroimmunology, my recent projects investigate sepsis-associated encephalopathy and autoimmune encephalitis.

Sepsis is more than just the red inflammatory line on limbs after an injury of the hands or feet. Sepsis, also known as blood poisoning, is a life-threatening disease. Overall, each year 150.000 people are affected by sepsis in Germany. When people survive a severe sepsis, they frequently suffer from cognitive decline as a long-term effect. They are often re-hospitalized or in need of nursing which leads to a huge burden of the health care system as well. Since ICU treatments improve and protect more and more people from death, the number of people affected is even further growing.

Hence, we aim to develop therapeutic strategies to tackle the cognitive decline of sepsis survivors. This will not only relieve the health care system but will also improve the quality of life of thousands of affected people. To this end, we use a mouse model and human brain tissue samples to investigate how this sepsis associated decline develops.

Furthermore, I investigate patient-derived autoantibodies that cause autoimmune encephalitis.

E-Mail:

Tel: 03641 9 32 35 94

Vita

Since 01/2020

Post Doc
University Hospital Jena, Section “Translational Neuroimmunology”, Prof. C. Geis

06/2016 - 12/2019

PhD student, Biology
Georg-August-University Göttingen
Thesis “Functional characterization and molecular identification of neuroprotective receptors for erythropoietin-like ligands.”, supervisor Prof. R. Heinrich

04/2014 - 03/2016

Agricultural sciences M.Sc.
Georg-August-University Göttingen
Master’s project “Relevance and interactions of immunogenic envelope proteins in the replication cycle of poxviruses.”

10/2012 - 11/2014

Developmental, Neural and Behavioral Biology M.Sc.
Georg-August-University Göttingen
Master’s project „Erythropoietin-mediated neuroprotection and potential contribution of the cytokine receptor CRLF3 in insects.”

10/2009 - 09/2012

Biology B.Sc.
Georg-August-University Göttingen
Bachelor’s project „Drosophila melanogaster as a model for studying autism spectrum disorders: courtship and competition of neuroligin-2 deficient flies.”

Additional qualification

11/2020 - 10/2021

Mentee of the Rowena-Morse-Mentoring Program,
Friedrich-Schiller-University Jena

03/2019

Organizer of the symposium
“Keeping neurons alive – erythropoietin, its variants and its receptors”,
hosted on the 13th Göttingen Meeting of the German Neuroscience Society

01/2016 - 06/2018

Advanced training for scientists
Certificate “Development and management of research projects”
University of Kassel and Philipps-University of Marburg

09/2017

Certificate “Good Manufacturing Practice”

Awards and scholarships

Travel grant of the German Neuroscience Society the 11th FENS Forum of Neuroscience in Berlin, July 2018.
2 x scholarship of Lower Saxony awarded by the Georg-August-University Göttingen, Faculty of Agricultural Sciences, winter semesters 2014 and 2015.
2 x scholarship of Lower Saxony awarded by the Georg-August-University Göttingen, Faculty of Biology and Psychology, winter semesters 2011 and 2013.

Funding

IMPULSE - project, Friedrich-Schiller-University Jena, 9.970 €, 01.01. – 31.12.2022
Center for Sepsis Control & Care (CSCC), 4.600 €, application for performance-based funding (leistungsorientierte Mittel – LOM), November 2020

Methods

Molecular cloning
Transcriptome analysis
Immunohistochemistry
Protein quantification
Recombinant protein expression
Flow cytometry

Peer-reviewed publications

Oliinyk D, Will A, Schneidmadel FR, Bohme M, Rinke J, Hochhaus A, Ernst T, Hahn N, Geis C, Lubeck M, Raether O, Humphrey SJ, Meier F (2024). "microPhos: a scalable and sensitive platform for high-dimensional phosphoproteomics" Mol Syst Biol, 10.1038/s44320-024-00050-9

Wickel J, Chung H-Y, Ceanga M, von Stackelberg N, Hahn N, Candemir Ö, Baade-Büttner C, Mein N, Tomasini P, Woldeyesus DM, Andreas N, Baumgarten P, Koch P, Groth M, Wang Z-Q´& Geis C (2024). "Repopulated microglia after pharmacological depletion decrease dendritic spine density in adult mouse brain." Glia, 1–17. https://doi.org/10.1002/glia.24541

Grünewald B, Wickel J, Hahn N, Rahmati V, Rupp H, Chung H-Y, Haselmann H, Strauss AS, Schmidl L, Hempel N, Grünewald L, Urbach A, Bauer M, Toyka KV, Blaess M, Claus RA, König R, Geis C (2024). "Targeted rescue of synaptic plasticity improves cognitive decline in sepsis-associated encephalopathy." Molecular Therapy, 2024, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ymthe.2024.05.001

N. Hahn , M. Bens , M. Kempfer , C. Reißig, L. Schmidl and C. Geis; Protecting RNA quality for spatial transcriptomics while improving immunofluorescent staining quality; Frontiers in Neuroscience, 2023 May 18, 17, doi: 10.3389/fnins.2023.1198154.

H.-Y. Chung, J. Wickel, N. Hahn, N. Mein, M. Schwarzbrunn, P. Koch, M. Ceanga, H. Haselmann, C. Baade-Büttner, N. von Stackelberg, N. Hempel, L. Schmidl, M. Groth, N. Andreas , J. Götze, S. M. Coldewey, M. Bauer, C. Mawrin, J. Dargvainiene, F. Leypoldt, S. Steinke, Z.-Q. Wang, M. Hust and C. Geis; Microglia mediate neurocognitive deficits by eliminating C1q-tagged synapses in sepsis-associated encephalopathy; 2023, Science Advances 9(21): eabq7806, doi:10.1126/sciadv.abq7806.

N. Hahn, L. Büschgens, N. Schwedhelm-Domeyer, S. Bank, B. R. H. Geurten, P. Neugebauer, B. Massih, M. C. Göpfert, R. Heinrich; The Orphan Cytokine Receptor CRLF3 Emerged With the Origin of the Nervous System and Is a Neuroprotective Erythropoietin Receptor in Locusts; 2019 Oct 11, Frontiers in Molecular Neuroscience 12:251, doi: 10.3389/fnmol.2019.00251.

N. Hahn, D. Y. Knorr, J. Liebig, L. Wüstefeld, K. Peters, M. Büscher, G. Bucher, H. Ehrenreich, R. Heinrich; The Insect Ortholog of the Human Orphan Cytokine Receptor CRLF3 Is a Neuroprotective Erythropoietin Receptor; 2017 Jul 14, Frontiers in Molecular Neuroscience 10:223, doi: 10.3389/fnmol.2017.00223.

K. Corthals, A. S. Heukamp, R. Kossen, I. Großhennig, N. Hahn, H. Gras, M. C. Göpfert, R. Heinrich, B. R. H. Geurten; Neuroligins Nlg2 and Nlg4 Affect Social Behavior in Drosophila melanogaster; 2017 Jul 10, Frontiers in Psychiatry 8:113, doi: 10.3389/fpsyt.2017.00113.

N. Hahn, B. R. H. Geurten, A. Gurvich, D. Piepenbrock, A. Kästner, D. Zanini, G. Xing, W. Xie, M. C. Göpfert, H. Ehrenreich, R Heinrich; Monogenic heritable autism gene neuroligin impacts Drosophila social behavior; 2013 Jun 19, Behavioural Brain Research 252, 450–457.

Other publications

B. Grünewald, J. Wickel, N. Hahn, F. Hörhold, .H. Rupp, H-Y. Chung, H. Haselmann, A.. Strauss, L. Schmidl, N. Hempel, L. Grünewald, A. Urbach, M. Blaess, R.A. Claus, R. König, C. Geis; Targeted rescue of synaptic plasticity improves cognitive decline in sepsis-associated encephalopathy, bioRxiv 2021, doi: 10.1101/2021.03.04.433352; Preprint.

N. Hahn & R. Heinrich; Neuroligine, synaptische Regulation und das Sozialverhalten von Mensch und Fliege, BioSpektrum, 05.15, 21. Jahrgang, 476-479, DOI: 10.1007/s12268-015-0602-y. Scientific print magazine.