Discipline: Biological Sciences

Our laboratory investigates the impact of gene regulation in health and disease. We work in both yeast (Cryptococcus) and in mammalian cells.

Research in my laboratory focuses on the molecular basis of the interaction of tomato with the bacterial pathogen, Pseudomonas syringae pv. tomato. This interaction provides a powerful experimental system to address three important questions in plant-pathogen biology: 1) What are the key host components that play a role in the immune response triggered by microbe-associated … Continued

My research interests center on arthropod physiology, specifically the physiology of tracheate arthropods such as insects. I am interested in the tightrope they walk between obtaining sufficient oxygen to breathe and desiccating as a result of respiratory water loss, and have spent much of my career unraveling the mysteries of their complex, three-phase gas exchange … Continued

I study the self-renewing mechanism of stem cells, using Drosophila germline stem cells, mouse germline, embryonic, and neural stem cells, as well as Hydra and planarian stem cells as models. I also work on stem cell-related cancers and germline development. My group has made key contributions to the demonstration of stem cell asymmetric division and … Continued

My laboratory studies the development and function of the vertebrate brain. To address these questions, we are developing new technologies that will allow us to identify genes involved in the assembly of brain circuits. Recently, we have generated a new technique that allows for the generation of transgenic animals in species of great interest for … Continued

I have been pursuing a scientific problem identified in graduate school in the early 1990s: how does a gene originate and evolve? My early works, supported by the Packard Fellowship and other federal science agencies, overturned traditional theories about evolution of new molecular functions and rewrote textbooks in related fields and shaped a new field … Continued

Germ cells transmit the potential to build a completely new organism to their offspring. The mechanisms that endow germ cells with the ability to propagate totipotency across generations are poorly understood. My lab studies how germ cells are set apart from somatic cells during embryogenesis, how early germ cells are guided to the gonad, and … Continued

The human gut is home to trillions of microbes that serve beneficial purposes. However my recent research has shown that the wrong mix of ‘normal’ microbes can be detrimental to health. In this research I will investigate how variation in the human genome relates to variation in the diversity and functions of microbes in the … Continued

My lab studies the molecular mechanisms of aging and genetic determinants of complex human traits, using system biology approaches that combine quantitative experiments with theoretical modeling and bioinformatics analysis. The lab has developed microfluidic devices to analyze aging at the molecular level in single cells and genetic systems for high throughput lifespan screening. The lab … Continued

The research goal of my laboratory is to understand the unusual transmission genetics of positive-strand RNA viruses and thereby to identify paradigms with relevance to other fields as well. Transmission genetics is an especially interesting topic in the case of RNA viruses. These are nature’s most mutable genomes; this is not only biochemically and genetically … Continued