Karine Bourdages, who completed part of her doctoral work in our lab at the Universite de Montreal, successfully defended her thesis on Friday March 2, at the U de M. Karine worked on cytokinesis in the vulval precursor cells of C. elegans, a truly in situ model of epithelial biogenesis. She published her work in PLoS1, and also published a review in Developmental Cell and contributed to a Methods in Cell Biology chapter. When Amy moved to UNC, she transferred into the lab of Mike Tyers, where she performed genome-wide CRISPR to determine the molecular underpinnings of mammalian cell size regulation. She contributed to a paper in Molecular and Cellular Biology, was awarded a Cole Foundation Fellowship, and generated results for forthcoming manuscripts. In a 2.5 hour public presentation and questioning session, Karine successfully defended her work on these two very different systems, and was awarded her PhD.

“Chemistry in the Biology Department” featured several science couples among our outstanding colleagues.

A photo accompanied the online version of the article.

Alexander Bell was born December 26, 2017 to proud parents Katie Rehain Bell and David Bell. Welcome, baby Alex!

Non-muscle myosin II (NMM-II) is thought to drive the cytoskeletal remodelling that closes the cytokinetic ring. But NMM-II can function as a cross-linker and not just a motor. The literature contains increasing evidence that cross-linkers do not simply drive or brake cytoskeletal remodelling, but rather that they play a positive (driving) role up to a certain threshold, over which they hinder (brake) remodelling. Carlos found this to indeed be the case for NMM-II and for the non-motor cross-linker anillin, in cells. Daniel created an agent-based model of the cytokinetic ring, and found evidence there also that both motor and non-motor cross-linkers play positive and negative roles in the cytoskeletal remodelling that achieves cytokinesis.

The award, created by members of the class of 1986, recognizes one member of the faculty per year who has exemplified excellence in inspirational teaching. The winner is selected from all full-time faculty who teach undergraduates. Amy is very grateful to the nominating committee and all the colleagues and former students whose recommendations supported her nomination. She was recognize with other award winners at the UNC-GeorgiaTech basketball game!

covered in the DTH!

Amy is relieved to have completed the various hurdles involved with her application for tenure and promotion in UNC Biology this fall. She presented her seminar to a packed audience of cherished colleagues from Biology and the med school, and her parents! Biology Chair Vicki Bautch gave a very kind introduction, and many esteemed faculty members offered stimulating discussion points and questions after the talk.

Michael Werner and Daniel Cortes, the two postdoctoral fellows from the lab, have been selected to give talks at the annual meeting of the American Society for Cell Biology, to take place in Philadelphia on Dec 2-6, 2017. Michael will speak about his work on novel cytokinetic ring dynamics in vivo. Daniel will present his agent-based modeling and quantitative imaging of contractile rings.

Amy presented work from Michael, Daniel, Katie, Molly, Larry, and herself at the Septin meeting in Berlin. Held at the historic Harnack Haus at the Freie Universitat Berlin, and organized by Helge Ewers and Serge Mostowy, the meeting was well-run, intimate, and scientifically terrific.

We are proud and excited to have renewed our NIH R01 grant entitled “Mechanisms of Cell Shape Change in Cytokinesis.” This funding will allow us to explore the molecular and mechanical mechanisms of time-delayed negative feedback in the actomyosin contractile cytoskeleton that underlie the dynamics we recently discovered, including speed oscillations. Current lab members Michael Werner, Daniel Cortes, and Katie Rehain-Bell contributed the preliminary results that made this proposal a success.

BBSP and Biology graduate students should peruse the BBSP rotation project listing site or contact us to explore rotation possibilities!