About the lab:

Our lab is integrated into a more senior group headed by Dr. Menno Oudhoff. Our main scientific goal is to understand how diseases in mucosal surfaces such as the gut are started and develop in time including processes such as intestinal repair and tumorigenesis. 

Our laboratory consists of an international team of enthusiastic biologists, with an exciting and extremely good work environment.  

About me:

I am currently a Group leader at CEMIR, at the Department of Clinical and Molecular Medicine (IKOM) at NTNU. I did a Bachelor's in Science, Biology, (2009) at the Universidad Complutense de Madrid, and a Master Degree in Molecular Biomedicine (2010) at the Universidad Autonoma de Madrid. After finishing my PhD in 2016 at CNIC (National Center for Cardiovascular Research, Spain) under the supervision of Alicia G.Arroyo, I moved to Norway to work as a postdoc at Menno's Oudhoff group. Here I obtained a Marie Skłodowska-Curie Action Individual Fellowship (MSCA-IF) to study the interplay between the intestinal muscle and stem cells. Recently, I was awarded the Young Researcher Talent grant, allowing me to start my own group. 

Last published Journal Articles

• Smooth muscle-specific MMP17 (MT4-MMP) regulates the intestinal stem cell niche and regeneration after damage. Mara Martín-Alonso*, Sharif Iqbal, Pia M. Vornewald, Håvard T. Lindholm, Mirjam J. Damen, Fernando Martínez, Sigrid Hoel, Alberto Díez-Sánchez, Maarten Altelaar, Pekka Katajisto, Alicia G. Arroyo & Menno J. Oudhoff*. Nat Commun 12, 6741 (2021).*Corresponding authors.

• Intestinal-epithelial LSD1 controls goblet cell differentiation and effector responses required for gut immunity to bacterial and helminth infection. Naveen Parmar; Kyle Burrows; Pia Vornewald; Håvard T. Lindholm; Rosalie T. Zwiggelaar; Alberto Díez-Sanchez; Mara Martín-Alonso; Madeleine Fosslie; Bruce Vallance; John Arne Dahl; Colby Zaph; Menno Johannes Oudhoff. PlosPathogens. 2021 March31.

• Il4ra -independent vaginal eosinophil accumulation following helminth infection exacerbates epithelial ulcerative pathology following HSV-2 infection. Alisha Chetty; Matthew G Darby; Pia M Vornewald; Mara Martín-Alonso; Anna Filz; Manuel Ritter; Henry J McSorley; Lindi Masson; Katherine Smith; Frank Brombacher; Matthew K O'Shea; Adam F Cunningham; Bernhard Ryffel; Menno J Oudhoff; Benjamin G Dewals; Laura E Layland; William Horsnell. Cell Host and microbe. 2021. April, 21; 29(4)

• LSD1 represses a neonatal/reparative gene program in adult intestinal epithelium. Rosalie Zwiggelaar*, Håvard Lindholm*, Madeleine Fosslie, Marianne Pedersen, Yuki Ohta, Alberto Diez-Sanchez, Mara Martín-Alonso, Jenny Ostrop, Mami Matano, Naveen Parmar, Emilie Kvaløy, Roos Spanjers, Kamran Nazmi, Morten Rye, Finn Drabløs, Cheryl Arrowsmith, John Arne Dahl, Kim Jensen, Toshiro Sato, Menno J. Oudhoff. *Authors with equal contribution. Sci Adv. 2020 Sep 11;6(37).

• MT4-MMP deficiency increases patrolling monocyte recruitment to early lesions and accelerates atherosclerosis. Cristina Clemente, Cristina Rius, Laura Alonso-Herranz, Mara Martín-Alonso, Ángela Pollán, Emilio Camafeita, Fernando Martínez, Rubén A. Mota, Vanessa Núñez, Cristina Rodríguez, Motoharu Seiki, José Martínez-González, Vicente Andrés, Mercedes Ricote & Arroyo AG. Nat Commun 2018 March 9, 910.

• E-cadherin cleavage by MT2-MMP regulates apical junctional signaling and epithelial homeostasis in the intestine. Gómez-Escudero J,* Moreno V,*, Martín-Alonso M, Feinberg T, Hernández de Riquer MV, Colmenar A, Calvo E, Camafeita E, Martínez F, Oudhoff MJ, Weiss SJ, and Arroyo AG. J Cell Sci. 2017 Dec 1;130(23):4013-4027. *Authors with equal contribution.

This work resulted in a Cover picture of the issue, taken by me, of an organoid knockdown for MT2-MMP (MMP15). https://jcs.biologists.org/content/130/23.cover-expansion

• Deficiency of MMP17/MT4-MMP proteolytic activity predisposes to aortic aneurysm in mice. Martín- Alonso M, García-Redondo AB, Guo D, Camafeita E, Martínez F, Alfranca A, Méndez-Barbero N, Pollán Á, Sánchez-Camacho C, Denhardt DT, Seiki M, Vázquez J, Salaices M, Redondo JM, Milewicz D, Arroyo AG. Circ Res. 2015 Jul 3;117(2):e13-26.