# Danesh Moazed Professor of Cell Biology Department of Cell Biology, Harvard Medical School Investigator, Howard Hughes Medical Institute ![Danesh Moazed Photo](/sites/g/files/omnuum9451/files/styles/hwp_4_5__320x400/public/biophysics/files/danesh_moazed_0.jpg?itok=kENB8COH) location\_on LHRRB Building, Room 517 240 Longwood Avenue, Boston, MA 02115 smartphone [617 432-1258]() email [danesh\_moazed@hms.harvard.edu](mailto:danesh_moazed@hms.harvard.edu) laptop\_windows [Moazed Laboratory Home Page](https://moazed.hms.harvard.edu/) laptop\_windows [Moazed Lab Publications](https://moazed.hms.harvard.edu/publications) We are interested in understanding how epigenetic chromatin domains are assembled and stably propagated. Research in the Moazed lab is focused on the remarkable ability of heterochromatic domains of DNA to heritably silence genes and transposons. These functions of heterochromatin are indispensable for maintenance of cell identity and genome stability, and their loss is prominently associated with developmental abnormalities, cancer, and age-associated neurodegenerative diseases. Our lab has demonstrated that nuclear RNAi and other RNA decay pathways play critical roles in heterochromatin assembly and elucidated how the RNAi machinery localizes to specific chromosome regions to establish heterochromatin. We have further demonstrated that although heterochromatin can mediate its own epigenetic propagation independently of DNA sequence, RNAi and specific DNA sequences are also crucial for heterochromatin maintenance. By deciphering the underlying mechanisms that assemble and epigenetically maintain heterochromatin, our studies provide a foundation for understanding how heterochromatin contributes to epigenetic maintenance of cell identity and how it decays during aging and in diseases such as cancer and neurodegeneration. Selected References: Holoch D, Moazed D (2015). RNA-mediated epigenetic regulation of gene expression. *Nature Reviews Genetics* 16, 71-84. Ragunathan K, Jih G, Moazed D (2015). Epigenetic inheritance uncoupled from sequence-specific recruitment. *Science* 348 (6230):1258699. Wang X, Moazed D (2017). DNA sequence-dependent mechanism for epigenetic inheritance of H3K9 methylation. *Science* 356, 88-91. Jih G, Iglesias N, Currie MA, Bhanu NV, Paulo JA, Gygi SP, Garcia B, Moazed D (2017). Unique roles for histone H3K9me states in RNAi and heritable silencing of transcription. *Nature* 547, 463-467. Yu R, Wang X, Moazed D (2018). Epigenetic inheritance mediated by coupling of RNAi and histone H3K9 methylation. *Nature* 558, 615-619. Iglesias N\*, Currie M\*, Jih G, Paolo JA, Suiti N, Kalocsay M, Gygi SP, Moazed D (2018). Automethylation-induced conformational switch in Clr4/SUV39H maintains epigenetic stability. *Nature* 560, 504-508. - ## Faculty Alphabetical [Faculty K-O](/people-alphabetical/k-o) - ## People Terms [Faculty](/people-terms/faculty) [Affiliate Faculty](/people-terms/affiliate-faculty) [Accepting Rotation Students](/people-terms/accepting-rotation-students) [Biochemistry/ Molecular Biology/ Microbiology](/people-terms/biochemistry-molecular-biology) [Genetics/ Genomics, Proteomics & Transcriptomics](/people-terms/genomics) [Structural Biology](/people-terms/structural-biology) [Theoretical & Computational Biology](/people-terms/computational-biology-bioinformatics)