Scientific Presentations Summer 2009 - Dana-Farber/Harvard ...

More documents

Recommendations

Info

Nerve Regeneration II Further Studies on the Mechanisms of Mst3b Function Sherry Wu Mentor: Nina Irwin, PhD Children’s Hospital Boston Axon outgrowth is necessary for wiring the brain during development and repairing nerve damage following injury. I have previously shown that two proteins that are each part of protein complexes and are critical for axon outgrowth, Mst3b and RGS12, bind in response to growth factors to form a large protein complex. This summer, to learn more about their roles in a signal transduction pathway leading to axon outgrowth, I will complete experiments in which RNAi and mutated proteins will be used to analyze the mechanisms by which Mst3b and RGS12 regulate outgrowth. In addition, Nina Irwin has recently shown that Mst3b can be cleaved by caspase. I will examine the effects of caspase cleavage on the activity of Mst3b in COS-7 cells by transfection with plasmids expressing wild-type, cleaved, or uncleavable Mst3b; and immunoprecipitating Mst3b from cell lysates to measure differences in kinase activity. I will study the role of caspase cleavage in the regulation of axon growth in response to growth factor by transfecting embryonic day 18 (E18) neurons with plasmids expressing wild-type, cleaved, or uncleavable Mst3b; and co-expressing Mst3b siRNA to block endogenous Mst3b expression. Interestingly, caspase cleavage removes the nuclear export signal in Mst3b, but retains the nuclear import signal. Thus, I hypothesize that cleaved Mst3b will be found in the nucleus. I will test this hypothesis by a localization assay using fluorescent microscopy of E18 neurons transfected with plasmids expressing wild-type, cleaved, or uncleavable EGFP/Mst3b. In summary, I expect that following the addition of growth factors, caspase cleavage allows nuclear localization of the Mst3b and RGS12 protein complex, which I predict to be necessary for axon outgrowth to occur.
Alumni Notable Achievements This past year a CURE student: • Completed their second year at Chicago Medical School. • Presented a scientific poster at the Annual Biomedical Research Conference for Minority Students. • Won the 2008 Annual Biomedical Research Conference for Minority Students award in Cell Biology Oral presentation. • Was a Tufts Summer Scholar. • Enrolled in the MED Prep program at UNC Chapel Hill. • Presented research at the National McNair Scholars Research Conference. • Participated in Project Success 2009. • Was employed in the Vidal lab at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute. • Won the Harvard Vanguard Scholarship. • Received the Gardener’s Award for Research in Science. • Obtained a scholarship from Genzyme. • Was awarded 1st Place in the Massachusetts State Science and Engineering Fair 2007 and was a finalist in the Intel International Science and Engineering Fair (ISEF) 2007. • Was inducted as a member of National Honors Society 2008. • Received the Gateway to Research Scholarship from the American Foundation for Pharmaceutical Education. • Traveled to Brazil to conduct cancer research. • Attended one of these conferences: the National Conference for Undergraduate Researchers, American Association of Cancer Research Conference, or the Biomedical Science Careers Program. • Presented a poster or an oral presentation at the New England Science Symposium. • Finished their first year at Boston Medical School.
Page 1 and 2: Dana-Farber/Harvard Cancer Center C
Page 3: CURE Scientific Presentations Dana
Page 6 and 7: Production of ß 2 M and HLA-A2 for
Page 8 and 9: The extracellular matrix influences
Page 10 and 11: Identification of novel genes that
Page 12 and 13: Co-crystallization of PIP2 and the
Page 14 and 15: Conjugating Aptamers to Nanorods Al
Page 16 and 17: The Growth of Malignant Plasma Cell
Page 18 and 19: High level baseline in language fmr
Page 20 and 21: Early Detection of Morphological Ch
Page 22 and 23: Investigating the role of Esrrb and
Page 24 and 25: Exploring the Effects of Estrogen o
Page 26 and 27: Untitled Michel Moravia Mentor: Mic
Page 28 and 29: Massively Parallel Amplification of
Page 30 and 31: The Role of TPBG in Melanoma Metast
Page 32 and 33: Role of selectins in the pathogenes
Page 34 and 35: Tumor-derived Neuropilin-2 acts as
Page 36 and 37: Genetic Characterization of a New L
Page 38 and 39: Optimizing HA Immunopurification St
Page 40 and 41: CDK8 overexpression as a possible r
Page 47 and 48: Dana-Farber/Harvard Cancer Center

Scientific Presentations Summer 2009 - Dana-Farber/Harvard ...

You also want an ePaper? Increase the reach of your titles

Delete template?

Save as template?