Maria Omsland
Maria Omsland
Maria Omsland is an associate professor affiliated with the K.G. Jebsen Center for Myeloid Blood Cancer (C-MYC) (UiB). She is a Biomedical Laboratory Scientist (Bioingeniør) and has an MSc and PhD in Medical Cell Biology from the University of Bergen.
The research focus has been cell-to-cell communication in leukemia, with a special emphasis on the cell-to-cell communicator tunneling nanotube (TNT). In the recent years the research focus has been on chronic myeloid leukemia (CML) and understanding the resistance mechanisms towards tyrosin kinase inhibitors (TKIs) and the biological side-effects of TKIs, by developing a resistance CML cell line and investigation of the neutrophil extracellular traps (NETs).
Omsland has been two periods at the National Cancer Institute (NCI), National Institutes of Health (NIH), Bethesda, USA. First as a guest researcher in 2015 and visiting fellow (Post Doc) in 2017-2019 at the Animal Models and Retroviral Vaccines Section, headed by Dr. Genoveffa Franchini.
Omsland has laboratory skills in Molecular Biology (immunoblotting, PCR techniques, cloning etc.) and Cell Biology (microscopy techniques (fluorescence light microscopy, confocal, electron microscopy, imaging mass cytometry etc.) and cell death assays.
Position
Associate Professor at Department of Safety, Chemistry and Biomedical laboratory sciences, Faculty of Technology, Environment and Social Sciences, Western Norway University of Applied Sciences. (Profil page - Western Norway University of Applied Sciences)
Project involvement
Omsland is co-supervising two PhD-candidates at the K.G. Jebsen center For Blood Cancer. She is the main supervisor of a PhD-Candidate at Western Norway University of Applied Sciences, which Is co-supervised by the center leader of C-MYC.
Project leader of two projects: “Investigation of non-BCR-ABL dependent resistance in Chronic Myeloid Leukemia (CML)” and “Investigation of NET formation in CML and its role in cardiovascular side-effects resulting from TKI therapy”.
Selected Publications
Sefland Ø, Gullaksen SE, Omsland M, Reikvam H, Galteland E, Tran HTT, Spetalen S, Singh SK, Van Zeeburg HJT, Van De Loosdrecht AA, Gjertsen BT. Mass cytometric single cell immune profiles of peripheral blood from acute myeloid leukemia patients in complete remission with measurable residual disease. Cytometry B Clin Cytom. 2024 Jul 30. doi: 10.1002/cyto.b.22197. Epub ahead of print. PMID: 39078053.
Moles R, Sarkis S, Galli V, Omsland M, Artesi M, Bissa M, McKinnon K, Brown S, Hahaut V, Washington-Parks R, Welsh J, Venzon DJ, Gutowska A, Doster MN, Breed MW, Killoran KE, Kramer J, Jones J, Moniuszko M, Van den Broeke A, Pise-Masison CA, Franchini G. NK cells and monocytes modulate primary HTLV-1 infection. PLoS Pathog. 2022 Apr 4;18(4):e1010416. doi: 10.1371/journal.ppat.1010416. PMID: 35377924; PMCID: PMC9022856.
Omsland M, Andresen V, Gullaksen SE, Ayuda-Durán P, Popa M, Hovland R, Brendehaug A, Enserink J, McCormack E, Gjertsen BT. Tyrosine kinase inhibitors and interferon-α increase tunneling nanotube (TNT) formation and cell adhesion in chronic myeloid leukemia (CML) cell lines. FASEB J. 2020 Mar;34(3):3773-3791. doi: 10.1096/fj.201802061RR. Epub 2020 Jan 16. PMID: 31945226; PMCID: PMC10894852.
Omsland M, Pise-Masison C, Fujikawa D, Galli V, Fenizia C, Parks RW, Gjertsen BT, Franchini G, Andresen V. Inhibition of Tunneling Nanotube (TNT) Formation and Human T-cell Leukemia Virus Type 1 (HTLV-1) Transmission by Cytarabine. Sci Rep. 2018 Jul 24;8(1):11118. doi: 10.1038/s41598-018-29391-w. PMID: 30042514; PMCID: PMC6057998.
Omsland M, Bruserud Ø, Gjertsen BT, Andresen V. Tunneling nanotube (TNT) formation is downregulated by cytarabine and NF-κB inhibition in acute myeloid leukemia (AML). Oncotarget. 2017 Jan 31;8(5):7946-7963. doi: 10.18632/oncotarget.13853. PMID: 27974700; PMCID: PMC5352373.