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Michal Hershfinkel​​

I received my Ph.D. in 1999 on my work on electrical characterization of semiconducting nanostructures, using an STM, in the laboratory of Prof. Vittorio Volterra in the department of Physics. During my post-doctoral study, I adapted a live cell imaging approach for the study of fundamental cellular processes linked to zinc homeostasis, and later identified the zinc sensing receptor ZnR/GPR39. I have my own laboratory since 2002, in the department of Physiology and Cell biology, at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev. My laboratory focuses on revealing the cellular pathways activated by zinc, and focuses on the roles of zinc in regulating epithelial cell ion transport, proliferation as well as cancer cell migration and neuronal signalling. I have been a founding member of the International Society of Zinc Biology, ISZB, served on its board and was the president of the society on 2015-2017. I am currently the head of the School of Biomedical Research in the Faculty of Health Sciences, in BGU.

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Hila Asraf
Received her PhD in 2009 in Pharmacology. Works as a research associate in the zinc lab since 2009.

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Moran Melamed
PhD student, working on ZnR/GPR39 in the salivary gland.

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Stefania Nordio
PhD student, working on zinc transporters, specifically in the dorsal cochlear nucleus.​

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Subhajit Sarkar
PhD student,




Noa Gottesman
PhD student, graduated 2023, worked on ZnT1 mechanism of zinc transport.
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 Milos Bogdanovic

PhD student, graduated 2024, working on ZIP transporters in the hippocampus.

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Dr. Moumita Chakraborty
PhD, graduated in 2020, worked on the role of ZnR/GPR39 in breast cancer.

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​Romi Sagi
MSc, graduated in 2020, worked on the behavioural phenotype of mice lacking ZnR/GPR39.

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