Vittoria Zinzalla
Cell biologist who, in Michael Hall's Basel lab, found that mTORC2 is switched on by binding to ribosomes, and later moved to cancer pharmacology at Boehringer Ingelheim in Vienna
Pharmacology and Translational Research, Boehringer Ingelheim RCV, Vienna (2017–2020, most recent confirmed affiliation) · postdoc, Biozentrum, University of Basel, Michael N. Hall lab (2008–2012) · University of Milano-Bicocca, Lilia Alberghina group (2005–2007)
mTORC2 controls the kinase Akt, but in 2011 it was not clear what switches mTORC2 on. Vittoria Zinzalla, as first author of a Cell paper with Michael Hall, used a genetic screen in yeast and then mammalian cells to find the answer: mTORC2 needs ribosomes, the protein-making machines of the cell. It needs the ribosomes themselves, not ongoing protein synthesis. Active mTORC2 sits on the ribosome, and insulin signalling through PI3K increases this binding. The authors proposed that this link lets mTORC2 respond to how ready a cell is to grow. Data from melanoma and colon cancer cells suggested this may matter in cancer. The work was done in yeast and cultured cells.
Zinzalla trained in yeast cell-cycle research at the University of Milano-Bicocca in Italy, in Lilia Alberghina's group. As first author in 2007, Zinzalla showed that rapamycin stops yeast cells before they copy their DNA partly by acting on the cell-cycle brake Sic1.
After Basel, Zinzalla moved to industry. PubMed lists Zinzalla at Boehringer Ingelheim RCV in Vienna, in pharmacology and translational research, on a 2017 Cell study that built a living biobank of breast cancer organoids and a 2020 study on switching off the BCL6 gene in lymphoma cells. Zinzalla's current role could not be confirmed.
Milestones in the Atlas
A selection, not a full bibliography: only papers that meet the Atlas inclusion criteria.
| Year | Evidence | Study |
|---|---|---|
| 2011 | M | Activation of mTORC2 by association with the ribosome ZIN2011 First author: showed that mTORC2 is activated by binding to ribosomes downstream of PI3K. |
Co-authors in the Atlas 2
People with a profile here who share at least one study with Vittoria Zinzalla.
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- Daniele Stracka Co-author of two studies from Michael Hall's laboratory in Basel that placed mTORC2, the second mTOR complex, at the ribosome and at contact sites between the endoplasmic reticulum and mitochondria
- Michael N. Hall Discovered TOR in yeast in 1991 and established it as a central controller of cell growth that responds to nutrients. His lab later showed that TOR works in two distinct complexes, TORC1 and TORC2, only one of which is blocked by rapamycin
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