49A
lthough neurobiologist Oded
Rechavi comes from a family of
doctors and researchers, it was
not his original plan to go into science.
“It wasn’t something that I had thought
about,” he tells The Scientist. Instead, he
went to Paris after high school to train
as an artist and exhibited his work in his
home country of Israel before enrolling
at Te l Aviv University. “I still didn’t know
exactly what I’d do, whether I’d be an
artist or something else,” he says.
At university, Rechavi became
interested in studying psychology,
philosophy, and biology—specifically, the
biology of the brain, which fascinated
him. He earned a bachelor’s degree in
neuroscience in 2006 and then went
on to do a PhD, also at Te l Aviv. For his
graduate work, he pivoted his focus to
immune cells and found that when T
and B cells connect with each other,
they exchange macromolecules such as
small interfering RNAs (siRNAs) that can
break down messenger RNA molecules,
preventing them from being translated
into proteins—a process known as
RNA interference, or RNAi (Genes Dev,
23:1971–79, 2009). “Now we know that
small RNAs are exchanged in many
different organs,” he says.
Rechavi continued to study RNA
as a postdoc in Oliver Hobert’s lab at
Columbia University in New York. “It was
pretty clear when he came to visit the lab
that he was really very special—incredibly
thoughtful, creative, and very excited
and engaged about the projects that we
discussed,” Hobert says. One of those
projects was investigating siRNAs that
C. elegans produces as a defense against
viral infection. In 2011, Rechavi and
colleagues demonstrated that the worms
passed down those siRNAs from parent
to offspring (Cell, 147:1248–56). “There’s
no virus that infects C. elegans efficiently,”Rechavi explains. “Only mutants that
are defective in RNA [interference] are
infected with viruses, and this could be in
part because [nematodes] inherit siRNAs.”
In 2012, Rechavi moved back to Israel
and established his own lab at his alma
mater. Inspired by human epidemiological
studies, which have suggested that
famine is associated with an increased
risk of diabetes, heart disease, and
obesity in subsequent generations, he
wanted to see if changes in siRNAs
caused by an environmental stressor
could be inherited several generations
down the line in nematodes. Sure enough,
Rechavi’s group, in collaboration with
Hobert, showed that starving nematodes
passed down siRNAs that cause silencing
of genes involved with fat regulation
and stress resistance (Cell, 158:277–87,
2014). “We showed that small RNAs
leave a mark that’s perceived for multiple
generations after starvation,” Rechavi
says. Additional studies from his group
showed that inherited siRNAs can also
have effects on movement and even
decision making in the worms.
“He’s got a great model system in
C. elegans.... It was very impactful,
and it shed a new light on these
problems,” says Michael Levin, a
systems biologist at Tufts University
who studies planarian flatworms
and has written review papers with
Rechavi on RNA inheritance. “I always
thought that his work was particularly
creative and rigorous, and I think he has
a very unique kind of mind.”
Although Rechavi ended up focusing
his career on science instead of art, he
often looks for ways to combine the
two. He’s a research associate in an
interdisciplinary group of artists and
scientists that focuses on culture, society,
and philosophy at the Va n Leer Jerusalem
Institute. And he’s also using Twitter toorganize a February 2020 conference in
Te l Aviv informally called “The Woodstock
of Biology,” which will feature a collaborative
art exhibition focusing on natural resources.
“He has a lot of research interests
and an infectious enthusiasm for things,”
Hobert says. “The extent of his creativity
really knows no bounds.”gSCIENTIST TO WATC HOded Rechavi: Epigenetic Expressionist
© YADID LEVY PHOTOGRAPHY
49Associate Professor, Tel Aviv University, Age: 39BY EMILY MAKOWSKI01/02.2020 | THE SCIENTIST 494949494949494949494949