Astrid Böhne

Head of Section

Comparative Vertebrate Genomics

Tel: +49 228 9122-365

Fax: +49 228 9122-212

Mail: A.Boehne [at] leibniz-lib.de

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Profile

Research interests

I am a molecular evolutionary biologist fascinated by the phenotypic diversity on our planet. I combine sequencing approaches with bioinformatics to disentangle how genomes and their evolution contribute to observable phenotypic differences.
My research comprises molecular biology, comparative genomics and transcriptome evolution driven by my motivation to search for genomic patterns contributing to biodiversity.

External websites and profiles

https://www.astridboehne.com/

https://twitter.com/astrid_boehne

https://ch.linkedin.com/in/astrid-b%C3%B6hne-105421123

Projects

2023

BIGFOOT

We face a global biodiversity crisis of unprecedented magnitude with devastating consequences for ecosystem viability. Besides anthropogenic habitat deterioration, fragmentation and climatic change, genomics can determine a population's fate but also can be used to assess its health. Yet, genomic patterns of species decline have only been shown for a few emblematic mammal species. Populations of some declining species are mostly assessed by classical census monitoring (e.g.

Unit:

Comparative Vertebrate Genomics, Comparative Insect Genomics

Project lead:

Astrid Böhne

Funding:

Leibniz Association

SynSex - Sexual selection and sexual conflict in Syngnathidae

Selection acts differently on males and females and drives their phenotypic dissimilarities. Most research has focused on males and how sexual selection shapes their ornaments and weaponry in the context of gaining access to female mates. This is not least due to the fact that humans, as most other vertebrates, show "conventional", "Darwinian" sex roles concentrating our perception on competitive males and caring mothers.

Unit:

Comparative Vertebrate Genomics

Project lead:

Astrid Böhne

Funding:

Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft

2022

BGE - Biodiversity Genomics Europe

Unit:

Comparative Vertebrate Genomics, Biobank, Metabarcoding, Lepidoptera, Hymenoptera, Diptera

Project lead:

Astrid Böhne

Funding:

European Union

DeRGA - Deutscher ReferenzGenom Atlas

German hub of the European Reference Genome AtlasBuilding up to the mission of the international ERGA, the German biodiversity genomics community aims at generating high-quality reference genomes of the German eukaryotic biodiversity:

Unit:

Comparative Vertebrate Genomics, Computational Genomics, High-performance Computing, Comparative Insect Genomics, Lepidoptera

Project lead:

Astrid Böhne

CellGen

The CellGen project is composed of two main parts. The first part investigates whether cell cultures accumulate mutations with progressive number of passages. One of the advantages of cell culture is to provide best quality of DNA/RNA and metaphases. Hence, we expect that cell culture will experience a renaissance in the light of high throughput sequencing techniques. However, it is still not clear how the number of passages (i.e., the number of times cells are transferred from vessel to vessel) can affect genetic and chromosomal composition.

Unit:

Biobank, Comparative Vertebrate Genomics, Hymenoptera

Project lead:

Dr. Camilla Bruno Di Nizo

ERGA - The European Referen...

The European Reference Genome Atlas (ERGA) initiative is a pan-European scientific response to current threats to biodiversity. Reference genomes provide the most complete insight into the genetic basis that forms each species and represent a powerful resource in understanding how biodiversity functions. ERGA aims to sequence the genomes of all European species and will for this establish an interdisciplinary workflow.

Unit:

Comparative Vertebrate Genomics, Lepidoptera, Diptera, Comparative Insect Genomics, Biobank

Project lead:

Astrid Böhne

Funding:

European Union

ColLomic

High-quality genomes are an important basis for biological and evolutionary research. However, generating assemblies of high completeness and contiguity requires ideally fresh, flash-frozen samples. The availability of such samples has become a major limitation for biodiversity genomics, in particular for rare or endangered species, or species inhabiting remote regions. On the other hand, museum collections house millions of samples in Germany and worldwide.

Unit:

Comparative Vertebrate Genomics, Herpetology, Scientific Animal Keeping Facility, Biobank, Mammalogy

Project lead:

Astrid Böhne

Funding:

Leibniz Association

2021

Sex chromosomes in African cichlid fishes

The mechanisms of sex determination are diverse despite their unifying function in defining male and female sex within a species. They range from an array of environmental factors over different genetic sex determination systems to a complex interplay of extrinsic and intrinsic factors. These mechanisms are ultra-conserved in some organismal groups (e.g. all mammals share the same sex chromosomal system), however, in other groups even sister species vary in their way how sex is determined.

Unit:

Comparative Vertebrate Genomics

Project lead:

Astrid Böhne

Funding:

European Union, Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft

Hybrid swarm evolution in minnows

In biodiversity research, little is known so far about how hybridizations of a native and a non-native species can lead to the evolution of an invasive hybrid. A group of researchers led by Dr Madlen Stange is now studying this aspect in a project at the Zoological Research Museum Alexander Koenig – Leibniz Institute for Animal Biodiversity (ZFMK). The group is investigating the spread of Phoxinus, an ecologically important schooling fish, in the River Sieg, a 155 km tributary of the River Rhine.

Unit:

Junior Research Group (Minnow), Centre for Taxonomy and Morphology (ztm), Centre for Molecular Biodiversity Research (zmb), Metabarcoding, Ichthyology, Directorate, Chair Systematic Zoology, Comparative Vertebrate Genomics

Project lead:

Dr. Madlen Stange

Funding:

Leibniz Association

2018

Cell banking at the LIB Biobank

ZFMK Biobank archives viable cell material for research and ex-situ conservation.

Unit:

Biobank, Hymenoptera, Comparative Vertebrate Genomics

Project lead:

Dr. Jonas Astrin

Publications

Published in

2021

El Taher A, Böhne A, Boileau N, Ronco F, Indermaur A, Widmer L and Salzburger W. (2021) Gene expression dynamics during rapid organismal diversification in African cichlid fishes. Nature Ecology and Evolution 5:243–250, doi: 10.1038/s41559-020-01354-3.

[more]

Links:

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41559-020-01354-3

El Taher A, Ronco F, Matschiner M, Salzburger W and Böhne A. Dynamics of sex chromosome evolution in a rapid radiation of cichlid fishes. Science Advances 7(36):eabe8215, doi: 10.1126/sciadv.abe8215.

[more]

Links:

https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/sciadv.abe8215

Ronco F, Matschiner M, Böhne A, Boila A, Büscher HH, El Taher A, Indermaur A, Malinsky M, Ricci V, Kahmen A, Jentoft S and Salzburger W. (2021) Drivers and dynamics of a massive adaptive radiation in cichlid fishes. Nature 589:76–81, doi: 10.1038/s41586-020-2930-4 .

[more]

Links:

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-020-2930-4

Lichilin Ortiz N, El Taher A and Böhne A. (2021) Sex biased gene expression and recent sex chromosome turnover. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B, doi: 10.1098/rstb.2020.0107.

[more]

Links:

10.1098/rstb.2020.0107
https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/pdf/10.1098/rstb.2020.0107

2020

Matschiner M, Böhne A, Ronco F and Salzburger W. (2020) The genomic timeline of cichlid fish diversification across continents. Nature Communications 11, doi: 10.1038/s41467-020-17827-9 .

[more]

Links:

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-020-17827-9

2019

Böhne A, Weber A, Rajkov J, Rechsteiner M, Riss A, Egger B and Salzburger W. (2019) Repeated evolution vs common ancestry: Sex chromosome evolution in the haplochromine cichlid Pseudocrenilabrus philander. Genome Biology and Evolution 11(2):439-458, doi: 10.1093/gbe/evz003

[more]

Links:

https://academic.oup.com/gbe/article/11/2/439/5288588

El Taher A, Lichilin Ortiz N, Salzburger W and Böhne A. (2019) Time matters! Developmental shift in gene expression in head and trunk of the cichlid fish Astatotilapia burtoni. BMC Genomics 20:39, doi: 10.1186/s12864-018-5321-6.

[more]

Links:

https://bmcgenomics.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s12864-018-5321-6

Pages

Presentations

Media (TV, Radio...)

Radio interview for the WDR on sex change in fish

https://www1.wdr.de/mediathek/audio/wdr5/quarks/hintergrund/audio-flexib...

Radio interview for the WDR on sex chromosomes

https://www1.wdr.de/mediathek/audio/wdr5/quarks/die-kleine-anfrage/audio...

Teaching

I teach lectures and hands on exercises in genomics, genetics and bioinformatics.

If your are interested in Master or Bachelor projects, please get in touch.

For the seminar series MEEGene see

MEEGene: Museum seminar in Evolutionary and Environmental Genomics

Positions Held

since 06/2019

Head of Section Comparative Genomics, ZMB

04/2016-11/2019

Junior Group Leader, Zoological Institute, University of Basel, Switzerland

01/2011-03/2016

Postdoctoral researcher, Zoological Institute, University of Basel, Switzerland

01/2007-12/2010

Dissertation, Institute of Functional Genomics of Lyon, ENS de Lyon, France

10/2006-12/2006

Research Associate, Department of Physiological Chemistry, University of Würzburg, Germany

Education

12/2010

PhD in Life Sciences, ENS de Lyon, France

10/2003-10/2006

Master in Biology, University Würzburg, Germany

09/2004-02/2005

Internship in Genetics, University of Barcelona, Spain

09/2001-09/2003

Bachelor in Biology, University Würzburg, Germany

Grants

2021 - 2024 Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft DFG, Drivers and dynamics of sex chromosome evolution in African cichlid fishes
2021 - 2024 Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft DFG, Drivers and constraints of rapid adaptive diversification in Lake Poso ricefishes, an emerging model species flock
04/2016-11/2019, Swiss National Science Foundation SNSF, research grant Ambizione
03/2018, Swiss National Science Foundation SNSF, Flexibility grant
06/2016, Swiss National Science Foundation SNSF, 120% support grant
10/2015-0/2020, French Agence National de la recherche ANR, collaborative research grant Great Society Challenges CLIMSEX, main PI Jean-Francois Baroiller
02/2016, University of Basel, career support grant Antelope
12/2014, Freiwillige Akademische Gesellschaft Basel FAG, grant for an international visit
12/2013, Swiss National Science Foundation SNSF, International Short Visit grant
10/2013, Volkswagen Foundation, grant for the symposium "The vast world of evolution", joint application with Dr. Olivia Roth
04/2012-04/2014, Volkswagen Foundation, research grant Evolution
04/2011, Research Fund University of Basel, project funding
04/2011-04/2012 German Academic exchange service DAAD, postdoctoral fellowship
01/2007-12/2009, French Ministry of Higher Education and Research, fellowship MENRT European mobility

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Astrid Böhne

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Research interests

External websites and profiles

2023

2022

2021

2018

Pages

2021

2020

2019

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Media (TV, Radio...)

Positions Held

Education

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