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Doctor Caroline Janitz
Dr. Caroline Janitz is the Senior Technical Officer responsible for overall management of the next-generation sequencing facility at the Hawkesbury Institute for the Environment (HIE). Caroline came to the HIE in May 2011 from the Ramaciotti Centre for Gene Function Analysis at UNSW, where she led the Illumina next-generation sequencing.
She has established the next-generation sequencing facility at the HIE and successfully acquired the Illumina CSPro (Certified Service Provider) accreditation for sequencing services in 2012.
Caroline acquired her PhD in molecular genetics from the Freie Universität Berlin, Germany, under the supervision of Prof. Hans Lehrach, the Director of the Max Planck Institute for Molecular Genetics in Berlin. Her PhD thesis focused on an investigation of the molecular mechanism of renal damage in the course of rat hypertension using laser microdissection and Affymetrix gene expression profiling.
Areas of Expertise
Caroline’s main interest and professional expertise is in the field of next-generation sequencing including Illumina technology and Roche 454 pyrosequencing. She has more than 20 years experience in molecular biology, including extensive hands-on experience in genomic high-throughput technologies. For the last four years, she has managed Illumina and Roche sequencing platforms, providing outstanding, personalized customer service. Her expertise covers a broad range of Illumina applications, such as de novo sequencing, metagenomics, targeted resequencing using SureSelect, RNA-Seq (standard, directional, and normalized libraries) and epigenetic analysis (ChiP-Seq, MBD-Seq, and DNA nucleosome sequencing) as well as Roche shotgun and amplicon sequencing.
Caroline’s responsibilities include:
- Managing the operational activities of the next-generation sequencing facility including customer project design and quotation, data generation and processing.
- Supervision and training of NGS facility staff members.
- Coordination of sequencing projects for internal and external customers to ensure high quality data generation.
- Customization of new next-generation sequencing protocols according to individual customers’ needs.
Awards
- Young Investigator Award, Bonn 2003
Professional Training
- 2012- Sequencing: Advanced Troubleshooting & Best Practices (Illumina, San Diego)
- 2012- Roche GS Junior shot gun sequencing training (Roche Diagnostics, Hawkesbury Institute for the Environment, UWS)
- 2010- Illumina Genome Analyser Advanced User Training (Illumina, Singapore)
- 2009- GS FLX Titanium Reagents Training (Roche Diagnostics, Ramaciotti Centre for Genome Analysis, UNSW)
- 2009- Illumina Genome Analyser II Training (Illumina, Ramaciotti Centre for Genome Analysis, UNSW)
- 2007- Practical Training on Illumina Next-Generation Sequencing (Max Planck Institute for Molecular Genetics, Berlin)
Selected Publications
Mills JD, Nalpathamkalam T, Jacobs HI, Janitz C, Merico D, Hu P, Janitz M, (2013) 'RNA-Seq analysis of the parietal cortex in Alzheimer's disease reveals alternatively spliced isoforms related to lipid metabolism', Neurosci Lett, vol.536, pp 90-95
Twine NA, Janitz C, Wilkins MR, Janitz M, (2013) 'Sequencing of hippocampal and cerebellar transcriptomes provides new insights into the complexity of gene regulation in the human brain', Neurosci Lett, vol.541, pp 263-268
Deshpande NP, Kaakoush NO, Mitchell H, Janitz K, Raftery MJ, Li SS, Wilkins MR, (2011) 'Sequencing and validation of the genome of a Campylobacter concisus reveals intra-species diversity', PLoS One, vol.6, e22170
Janitz K, Janitz M, (2011) 'Assessing epigenetic information', Tollefsbol, T. (ed),Handbook of Epigenetics: The New Molecular and Medical Genetics. Elsevier, pp 173-181
Kaakoush NO, Deshpande NP, Wilkins MR, Raftery MJ, Janitz K, Mitchell H, (2011) 'Comparative analyses of Campylobacter concisus strains reveal the genome of the reference strain BAA-1457 is not representative of the species', Gut Pathogens, vol.3:15
Twine NA, Janitz K, Wilkins, MR, Janitz M (2011) 'Whole transcriptome sequencing reveals gene expression and splicing differences in brain regions affected by Alzheimer's disease', PLoS One, vol.6, e16266
Courtney E, Kornfeld S, Janitz K, Janitz M, (2010) 'Transcriptome profiling in neurodegenerative disease', J Neurosci Methods, vol.193, pp 189-202
Janitz K, Twine N, Wilkins M, Janitz M, (2010) 'Comprehensive analysis of transcriptome by means of RNA-Seq next-generation sequencing', Australian Biochemist, vol.41, pp 18-21
