Recently, the Van Meir Lab recived a R01 grant, titled “Targeting MBD2 for medulloblastoma therapy.”

In August 2025, the Van Meir Lab enjoyed a day of food, fun, and adventure together. The outing began with lunch at Farmhouse in Springville, Alabama, before the group set out on a three-mile kayaking trip down Big Canoe Creek. The day wrapped up in downtown Birmingham with dinner and drinks at Back Forty Beer Company.

On Thursday, May 15, 2025, the Van Meir Lab presented at the 3^rd Southeastern Brain Tumor Research Meeting (SBTRM) at the UAB Hill Center. The SBTRM seeks to build lasting collaborations among investigators in the southeastern United States whose research focuses on adult and pediatric brain tumors. 

On Saturday, May 17, 2025, members of the Van Meir Lab participated in the twelfth annual Blazer Bolt for Brain Cancer 5K and Fun Run.

The Van Meir Lab attended the 11^th Adhesion GPCR Consortium Workshop in Mexico City, held October 23-25, 2024.

All 3 graduate students in the lab had an oral presentation, and there were 4 posters presented as well.

“It was a great opportunity for networking and learn what other investigators are doing in our field,” said Erwin Van Meir.

While in Mexico City, the Van Meir Lab also experienced the Day of the Dead celebration and visited archeological sites such as Teotihuacan to learn about Mesoamerican culture.

“Novel Isoforms of Adhesion G Protein‐Coupled Receptor B1 (ADGRB1/ BAI1) Generated from an Alternative Promoter in Intron 17,” a recent study by the Van Meir research team has been published online in Molecular Neurobiology. 

Authors of the paper include current Van Meir lab members Erwin G. Van Meir, Ph.D., Rashed Rezwan Parag, and Kiyotaka Saitoh, Ph.D., as well as lab alumni Takahiro Yamamoto, M.D., Ph.D., Dan Zhu, Ph.D., and Liquan Yang, Ph.D.

As part of the Springer Nature Content Sharing Initiative, the paper can be accessed here: https://rdcu.be/dMeNi.

Congratulations to Jesse, Rashed and Alex on passing their qualifying exams last week. Rashed’s first author manuscript was also published in Molecular Neurobiology. The Van Meir Lab team went to Taco Mama to celebrate!

The Van Meir Lab team participated in the eleventh annual Blazer Bolt for Brain Cancer 5K and Fun Run was held Saturday, May 18, at Railroad Park in Homewood, Alabama. Pictured: Virginea De Araujo Farias and her husband, Andrea Comba, Sarah Kammerud, Dr. Erwin Van Meir and other friends!

Alex Torrelli-Diljohn presented a poster at the Family Strong Meeting for Brain Tumor Patients and Caregivers, hosted by the UAB O’Neal Comprehensive Cancer Center on Friday, May 17. 

Today, on April 30, 2024, the Van Meir lab gathered for a lunch to celebrate Yuki Kuranaga and the publication of her paper in Cells, an international, peer-reviewed, open access journal. Click here to read the paper.

Congratulations to Yuki Kuranaga on her recently accepted paper showing a unique role of integrin a3b1 in glioblastoma! Click here to read the paper.