Melissa M. McGovern, PhD

Assistant Professor

Departments of Otolaryngology and Neurobiology, University of Pittsburgh

Melissa received her Bachelor’s degree in Psychology from Illinois College in 2013 and her Ph.D. in Pharmacology and Neuroscience from Southern Illinois University in 2017. While in graduate school, she investigated the ability of the neonatal cochlea to naturally regenerate lost cells in the lab of Dr. Brandon Cox. Following graduation, Melissa completed her postdoctoral training at Baylor College of Medicine in the lab of Dr. Andy Groves, where she studied the ability of the mature cochlea to be reprogrammed by the activation of transcription factors. Melissa’s joined the faculty of the University of Pittsburgh in May 2023, where she investigates the genetic barriers in supporting cells that prevent their conversion into hair cells.

McGovern Lab Members

Janelle Gleim

Laboratory Manager

Maria Egidio

Research Technician

Liliana Burlingame

Research Technician

Alissa Buck

Research Technician

Selected Publications

McGovern, M.M., Ghosh, S., Dupuis, C., Walters, B.J., Groves, A.K. (2024) Reprogramming with Atoh1, Gfi1, and Pou4f3 promotes hair cell regeneration in the adult organ of Corti. PNAS Nexus, 3;10

McGovern, M.M, Niu, Y., Hosamani, I., Nguyen, K., Zong, C., Groves, A.K. Expression of Atoh1, Gfi1, and Pou4f3 in the mature cochlea reprograms non-sensory cells into hair cells. (2024) Proc Natl Acad Sci 121 (5) e2304680121

McGovern, M.M, Hartman, B., Thawani, A., Maunsell, H.R., Zhang, H., Heller, S., Stone, J., Groves, A.K. (2023) Fbxo2CreERT2: A new model for targeting cells in the neonatal and mature inner ear. Hearing Research 428:108686

Iyer, A., Hosamani, I., Nguyen, J.D., Cai, T., Singh, S., McGovern, M.M., Beyer, L.A., Zhang, H., Jen, H.-I, Yousaf, R., Birol, O., Sun, J., Ray, R.S., Raphael, Y., Segil, N., Groves, A.K. (2022). Cellular reprogramming with ATOH1, GFI1, and POU4F3 implicate epigenetic changes and cell-cell signaling as obstacles to hair cell regeneration in mature mammals. eLife, 11:e79712. DOI: https:// doi. org/ 10. 7554/ eLife. 79712

Teng-Wei Huang, Amrita Iyer, Jeanne Manalo, Junsung Woo, Navish Bosquez Huerta, Melissa McGovern, Heinrich Schrewe, Fred Pereira, Andrew K Groves, Kevin Ohlemiller, and Benjamin Deneen. (2021) Glial-Specific Deletion of Med12 Results in Rapid Hearing Loss via Degradation of the Stria Vascularis. J. Neurosci 41(34) 7171-7181

Gnedeva, L., Wang, X., McGovern, M.M., Tao, L., Trecek, T., Llamas, J., Makmura, W., Monroe, T., Martin, J.F., Groves, A.K., Warchol, M., Segil, N. (2020) Organ of Corti size is governed by Yap/Tead-mediated progenitor self-renewal. Proc Natl Acad Sci 117(24): 13552-13561

McGovern, M.M., Randle, M.R., Graves, K.A., Cuppini., C., & Cox, B.C. (2019) Multiple supporting cell subtypes are capable of spontaneous hair cell regeneration in the neonatal mouse cochlea. Development 146: 1-13

McGovern, M.M., Zhou, L., Randle, M.R., & Cox, B.C. (2018) Spontaneous Hair Cell Regeneration is Prevented by Increased Notch Signaling in Supporting Cells Front Cell Neurosci 12:1-17

McGovern, M.M., Brancheck, J.B., Grant, A.C., Graves, K.A., & Cox, B.C. (2017) Quantitative Analysis of Supporting Cell Subtype Labeling among CreER Lines in the Neonatal Mouse Cochlea. J Assoc Res Otolaryngol 18(2): 227-245