PROBING THE PRINCIPLES OF CELL SIGNALING AND BEHAVIOR

Signaling networks are the brains of the cell, processing information from the cell’s surroundings and allowing the cell to respond appropriately.  Several of our worst diseases, for example cancer, result from a breakdown in this process: the cellular brain perceives inputs that are not there, resulting in improper regulation of important cell behaviors like proliferation. We study how cells perceive molecular signals by using synthetic biology and optogenetics to stimulate and observe signals with high precision. We then apply these tools to measure differences in signal perception between normal cells and those that drive cancer, with the goal of understanding normal physiology, how disease arises, and how these insights can inspire new types of therapies.