My main research interest is to understand the cellular mechanisms involved in neurodegenerative disorders.

During my DPhil at the University of Oxford, I dissected the mechanisms underlying degeneration of specific neurons in two mouse models of movement disorders. In particular, I studied the novel mitochondrial oxidative resistance (Oxr1) gene and its role in neuronal survival and its protective effect against oxidative stress.

During my first postdoc at Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York City, I used a translational approach to study another neurological condition and I tested a possible therapeutic strategy to induce severed adult neurons to regenerate after a spinal cord injury.

For my second postdoc at the University of Oxford, I am investigating the function of a family of proteins related to Oxr1, all sharing a highly conserved TLDc domain.

Finelli MJ*, Wong JK*, Zou H. 2013. Epigenetic regulation of sensory axon regeneration after spinal cord

injury. J. Neurosci.*These authors contributed equally.

Finelli MJ, Murphy KJ, Chen L, Zou H. 2013. Differential phosphorylation of Smad1 integrates BMP and

NGF signaling by regulating ERK/DUSP in axon development. Cell Reports.

Carroll B, Maximiano F, Frasa M, Finelli MJ, Francis R, Futter C, Dikic I, Braga VMM. 2012. The

TBC/RabGAP Armus regulates autophagy via a cross-talk between the small GTPases Rac1 and Rab7. Dev. Cell.

Oliver PL*, Finelli MJ*, Edwards B, Butts D, Davies KE. 2011. Oxr1 is essential for protection against

oxidative stress-induced neurodegeneration. PLoS Genet. *These authors contributed equally.

Bitoun E*, Finelli MJ*, Oliver PL, Lee S, Davies KE. 2009. AF4 is a critical regulator of the IGF-I pathway

in Purkinje cell function during cerebellum postnatal development. J. Neurosci. *These authors contributed equally

Hall SE, Mao A, Nicolaidou V, Finelli MJ, Wise EL, Nedjai B, Kanjanapangka J, Harirchian P, Chen D,

Selchau V, Ribeiro S, Schyler S, Pease JE, Horuk R, Vaidehi N. 2009. Elucidation of binding sites of dual

antagonists in the human chemokine receptors CCR2 and CCR5. Mol. Pharmacol.