Juliet Moncaster

Background

Dr Moncaster trained as a graduate student in retinal biology in Alzheimer’s Disease (AD) under the mentorship of Drs Steve Gentleman and Ling-Sun Jen at Imperial College London. She conducted her postdoctoral training in lens biology and AD first at Brigham and Women’s Hospital/Harvard Medical School and then Boston University both under the mentorship of Dr Lee Goldstein. She is a primary contributor in the development, application, and testing of the first generation QLS instruments for non-invasive in vivo early detection and quantitative assessment of AD-associated molecular pathology in the lens of the eye. This technology is now FDA-approved and currently undergoing clinical evaluation. Dr Moncaster was the primary contributor to the discovery of the cause of cataracts in Down syndrome (Moncaster, PloS One, 2010), which established the molecular linkage between Alzheimer’s disease pathology in the lens and brain that affects individuals with Down syndrome. She made major contributions to the discovery and biological validation of a new gene (CTNND2) linked to Alzheimer’s disease (Jun, PloS One, 2012). Dr Moncaster also played a key role in the discovery of a tau protein-linked neurodegenerative disease called Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy (CTE) in U.S. military veterans exposed to explosive blast during deployment and sport-related traumatic brain injuries (Goldstein et al., Science Trans Med, 2012; Kondo et al., Nature 2015; Tagge et al., Brain 2018).

Research Interests

Dr. Moncaster’s research focuses on Alzheimer’s Disease (AD), Down Syndrome, Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI), Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy (CTE), Lens biology and Retinal neurobiology.

Awards and Memberships

Dr Moncaster have been awarded the Mysell Research Award (Brigham & Women’s Hospital/Harvard Medical School), the Research Excellence Award (Brigham & Women’s Hospital/Harvard Medical School), and 2nd Prize for Translational Research from the NIH-funded Clinical & Translational Science Institute (CTSI), BU.
Dr Moncaster is a member of the Association for Research in Vision and Ophthalmology (ARVO); International Society to Advance Alzheimer’s Research and Treatment (ISTAART), Alzheimer’s Association; and National Postdoctoral Association (NPA).

Featured Publications

1. Moncaster JA, Walsh DT, Gentleman SM, Jen LS, Aruoma OI. Ergothioneine treatment protects neurons against N-methyl-D-aspartate excitotoxicity in an in vivo rat retinal model. Neurosci. Lett. 2002;328(1):55-9.
2. Croucher MJ, Patel H, Walsh DT, Moncaster JA, Gentleman SM, Fazal A, and Jen LS Up-regulation of soluble amyloid precursor protein (APP) fragment secretion in the rat retina in vivo by metabotropic glutamate receptor stimulation. NeuroReport 2003 Vol. 14 No. 13
3. Aruoma OI, Moncaster JA, Walsh DT, Gentleman SM, Ke B, Liang YF, Higa T and Jen LS. Effective Microorganism X (EM-X) protects retinal neurons in rats against N-methyl-D-aspartate excitotoxicity in vivo. Free Radical Research 2003 Vol. 37 (1): 91-97.
4. Anderson PJB, Watts HR, Jen S, Gentleman SM, Moncaster JA, Walsh DT Jen LS Differential effects of interleukin-1β and S100B on amyloid precursor protein in rat retinal neurons. Clinical Ophthalmology, 2009. PMC2708995.
5. Moncaster JA, Pineda R, Moir RD, Lu S, Burton M, Ghosh J, Ericsson M, Soscia SJ, Mocofanescu A, Folkerth R, Robb RM, Clark JI, Tanzi RE, Hunter DG, Goldstein LE. Alzheimer’s Disease Amyloid-β Links Lens and Brain Pathology in Down Syndrome. PLoS ONE 2010 5(5): e10659. PMC287394.
6. Liu J, Kohler JE, Blass AL, Moncaster JA, Mocofanescu A, Marcus MA, Blakely EA, Bjornstad KA, Amarasiriwardena C, Casey N, Goldstein LE, Soybel DI. Demand for Zn2+ in Acid-Secreting Gastric Mucosa and Its Requirement for Intracellular Ca2+. PLoS ONE 2011, 6(6): e19638. PMC3115935.
7. Kasaikina MV, Fomenko DE, Labunskyy VM, Lachke SA, Qiu W, Moncaster JA, Zhang J, Wojnarowicz MW Jr, Natarajan SK, Malinouski M, Schweizer U, Tsuji PA, Carlson BA, Maas RL, Lou MF, Goldstein LE, Hatfield DL, Gladyshev VN. 15 kDa selenoprotein (Sep15) knockout mice: roles of Sep15 in redox homeostasis and cataract development. J Biol Chem. 2011 Jul 18. PMC3190948.
8. Goldstein LE, Fisher AM, Tagge CA, Zhang XL, Velisek L, Sullivan JA, Upreti C, Kracht JM, Ericsson M, Wojnarowicz MW Jr., Goletiani, CJ, Maglakelidze GM, Casey N, Moncaster JA, Minaeva O, Moir RD, Nowinski CJ, Stern RA, Cantu RC, Geiling J, Blusztajn JK, Wolozin BL, Ikezu T, Stein TD, Budson AE, Kowall NW, Chargin D, Sharon A, Saman S, Hall GF, Moss WC, Cleveland RO, Tanzi RE, Stanton PK, McKee AC. Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy in Blast-Exposed Military Veterans and a Blast Neurotrauma Mouse Model. Sci. Transl. Med. 2012 May 16: Vol. 4 (134):p134.
9. Jun G, Moncaster J, Koutras C, Seshadri S, Bros J, McKee A, Levesque G, Wolf P, St George-Hyslop R, Goldstein L, Farrer L. d-Catenin is Genetically and Biologically Associated With Cortical Cataract and Future Alzheimer-Related Brain Changes, PLoS ONE, 2012 7(9):e43728. PMC3439481
10. Suh J, Moncaster JA, Wang L, Hafeez I, Tanzi RE, Herz J, Goldstein LE, Guénette SY. FE65 and FE65L1 amyloid precursor protein–binding protein compound null mice display adult-onset cataract and muscle weakness. FASEB J 2015 14-261453.
11. Kondo A, Shahpasand K, Mannix R, Qiu J, Moncaster J, Chen CH, Yao Y, Lin YM, Driver JA, Sun Y, Wei S, Luo ML, Albayram O, Huang P, Rotenberg A, Ryo A, Goldstein LE, Pascual-Leone A, McKee AC, Meehan W, Zhou XZ, Lu KP. Antibody against early driver of neurodegeneration cis P-tau blocks brain injury and tauopathy. Nature 2015 Jul 23; 523(7561):431-6. PMID: 26176913
12. Tagge CA, Fisher AM, Minaeva O, Gaudreau-Balderrama A, Moncaster JA, Zhang XL, Wojnarowicz MW Jr., Casey N, Lu H, Kokiko-Cochran ON, Saman S, Ericsson M, Onos, KD, Veksler R, Senatoroc VV, Kondo A, Zhou XZ, Miry O, Vose LR, Gopaul KR, Upreti C, Nowinski CJ, Cantu RC, Alvarez VE, Hildebrandt A, Franz ES, Konrad J, Hamilton JA, Hua N, Tripodis Y, Anderson AT, Howell GR, Kaufer D, Hall GF, Lu KP, Ransohoff RM, Cleveland RO, Kowall NW, Stein TD, Lamb BT, Huber BR, Moss WC, Friedman A, Stanton PK, McKee AC, Goldstein LE. Concussion, Microvascular Injury, and Early Tauopathy in Young Athletes after Impact Head Injury and an Impact Concussion Mouse Model. Brain 2018. Jan 18. PMID: 29360998