Katrina Wong
Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) is a neurodevelopmental disorder characterized by impairments in communication and atypical sensory responsivity. Recent research using Cntnap2 knock-out mice, a strain commonly used to investigate ASD, has established potential neural mechanisms underlying altered learning performance, such as behavioral flexibility and neural excitability. The Wilbrecht lab has previously identified the dorsal medial prefrontal cortex (dmPFC) as a hub for cognitive flexibility and maturation during adolescence. Understanding how ASD affects the development of the dmPFC is therefore essential. This project explores the neural basis of learning in adolescent […]
Mingxiao Wei
Retinal degeneration, including retinitis pigmentosa (RP), affects over 10 million people in the United States and leads to significant vision loss. During RP, photoreceptors die, yet the downstream neurons in the circuit responsible for visual information processing, including retinal ganglion cells (RGCs), survive. Successful vision restoration requires that these downstream neurons function normally. However, the surviving neurons undergo a process called remodeling which may be maladaptive and become a barrier to effective vision restoration. My project aims to investigate the impact of ion channel function changes on the physiological properties […]
Celine Wang
Alzheimer’s disease (AD) is the seventh leading cause of US deaths and the primary cause of elderly dementia. This neurodegenerative disease irreversibly impairs cognitive functions, creating significant physical and emotional burdens on patients, healthcare providers, and families. One major risk factor for AD is a variant of the APOE gene: APOE4. 60-85% of all AD patients possess this mutated gene known to contribute to neurological degeneration. Thus far, no therapies for AD are targeted enough to intervene with APOE4’s deteriorating effects. Recent findings, however, indicate that the psychedelic compound known […]
Akshara Vykunta
The Hedgehog (Hh) pathway directs gene expression programs that are essential for development and adult tissue homeostasis. However, misactivation of the Hedgehog pathway is known to drive cancer. Vertebrate Hh signals are transduced through the primary cilium, an antenna that projects from the surface of most cells. When the Hh pathway is off, the tumor suppressor Patched1 (Ptch1) localizes to cilia and inhibits Smoothened (Smo). Upon Hh pathway activation, Hh ligands bind to Ptch1, remove Ptch1 from cilia, and allow Smo to accumulate to cilia to activate the Gli family […]
James Pinto
Hyperelongate neural spines (HENSs), which often form a “sailback” along the axial column, have arisen independently in amniotes at least 12 times, in distantly related groups of animals over 100s of millions years. Suggestions for the functions of HENSs include that they served as thermoregulators, as display organs, and/or as biomechanical support. Osteohistology (internal bone microstructure) can be informative for comparing these hypotheses of HENS function, particularly using living taxa with HENSs, like species of lizards and bovids, as a framework for the relationship between structure and function in extinct […]
Henry Seaborne
All cells have specialized membranes that act as storage vesicles to hold in their essential machinery, sort what comes in and out of their cell, and countless other diverse functions that allow for cell viability. In my lab, we are focused on studying the membranes of the bacteria Caulobacter Crescentus because its unique ability to survive without a component that normally defers cell life or death. My project is working on categorizing how protein composition changes between normal and mutated Caulobacter Crescentus. and whether there’s a mechanism allowing for viability […]
Andy (“Yuying”) Liu
Do you know that sleep deficits might be foreshadowing Parkinson’s Disease (PD)? In fact, PD-related sleep problems, such as insomnia, excessive daytime somnolence, and REM sleep behavior disorder can begin decades before the display of motor dysfunction. Previous studies have identified a subset of GABAergic neurons in medial substantia nigra pars reticulata (SNr) to be preferentially active in states of sleep and low motor activity, and they also promote sleep when activated. Based on a newly developed behavior categorization system, I will investigate whether the activities of these GABAergic neurons […]
Arushi Lahiri
The evolutionary arms race between viruses and bacteria has set the stage for evolving research about CRISPR and other bacterial defense mechanisms and viral responses. Yet, little has been done to map viral subversion genes/proteins to specific bacterial defense systems. The purpose of my research will be to explore the relationship between novel bacterial defense systems and responsive phage subversion strategies immunity. More specifically, I will be extracting these defense systems before running phage assays across a variety of E. Coli phages to evaluate the susceptibility—and lack thereof—of each phage […]
Sanjana Kotha
While there has been a great amount of progress in understanding the genetic basis of autism spectrum disorder (ASD), there remain patients who carry novel mutations and do not have definitive diagnoses. Common patient mutations in ASD are known to overlap many genes coding for transcription factors (TFs). TFs regulate gene expression, and consist of DNA-binding domains and activation domains. It is currently unknown where in TFs these mutations are enriched. TFs have only recently been tiled and screened for activation domain activity. Before this, while variants associated with ASD […]
Anna Jahng
Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) is a developmental disability impacting 1 in 100 children. Pharmaceutical interventions exist for ASD but are cautioned due to adverse side effects, such as sedation and weight gain, emphasizing the importance of research into non-invasive therapies. Over the past decade, scientists have identified numerous ASD risk genes, including Tsc2. Past research from Wilbrecht lab showed that Tsc2 mutant mice have an initial gain of function in learning in an odor-based reinforcement learning task when the schedule is deterministic (100% reward for each correct action). Importantly, the […]