The Shoichiro's lab primary research interest is the mechanisms that regulate dynamic rearrangement of the actin cytoskeleton during various cellular events including development, cell movement, cytokinesis, and human diseases. We have been studying this problem using the nematode Caenorhabditis elegans as a model system. C. elegans has been used to study many aspects of development, because of its relative simplicity in the body patterning, and application of genetics, molecular biology, biochemistry, and cell biology. We are especially interested in the functions of the actin depolymerizing factor (ADF)/cofilin family of actin-binding proteins, which are required for enhancement of actin filament dynamics. We found that two ADF/cofilin proteins that are generated from the unc-60 gene have different actin-regulating activities. Mutation and expression analyses demonstrated that one of the two ADF/cofilin isoforms (UNC-60B) was specifically required for organized assembly of actin filaments in muscle. ADF/cofilin promotes depolymerization and severing of actin filaments, but tropomyosin inhibits this effect by stabilizing filaments. The other ADF/cofilin isoform (UNC-60A) is highly expressed in early embryos and regulates cytokinesis and embryonic patterning. In addition, we found that actin-interacting protein 1 (AIP1) is a new regulator of muscle actin filaments. AIP1 (UNC-78) specifically interacts with ADF/cofilin-bound actin filaments and enhances filament depolymerization. We also found that the gene product of sup-12 (an RBM24 homolog) regulates alternative splicing of the unc-60 gene and is required for generation of the unc-60B mRNA. We are currently studying functions of these proteins and other regulators of actin dynamics in several developmental aspects in C. elegans.

Michelle C. LaPlaca, Ph.D. is an Associate Professor in the Department of Biomedical Engineering, a joint department between Georgia Tech and Emory University. Dr. LaPlaca earned her undergraduate degree in Biomedical Engineering from The Catholic University of America, Washington, DC, in 1991 and her M.S.E. (1992) and Ph.D. (1996) in Bioengineering from the University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA, in the area of neuronal injury biomechanics. Following post-doctoral training in Neurosurgery at the University of Pennsylvania’s Head Injury Center from 1996-98, she joined the faculty at Georgia Tech. Dr. LaPlaca’s research interests are in neurotrauma, specifically: traumatic brain injury, injury biomechanics, cell culture modeling of traumatic injury, neural tissue engineering, and cognitive impairment associated with brain injury and aging. Her research is funded by NIH, NSF, and the Coulter Foundation.

Felipe trained as a biomedical engineer in his native Colombia before obtaining a PhD from the Biomedical Engineering department of Duke University. At Duke, working in the laboratory of Ashutosh Chilkoti, he focused on the engineering of genetically-encoded, self-assembling protein polymers. An important outcome of this PhD work was the elucidation of sequence rules to program the phase separation behavior of intrinsically disordered proteins (IDPs). Motivated by a newly acquired ability to engineer the phase behavior of IDPs, for his postdoctoral work he turned to their poorly-understood biology. To pursue skin as an outstanding biological system, Felipe joined the group of Elaine Fuchs at Rockefeller University. Felipe’s postdoctoral research led to the discovery that liquid-liquid phase separation drives the process of skin barrier formation. In 2020, he established the Quiroz Lab in the Wallace H. Coulter Department of Biomedical Engineering at Georgia Tech and Emory University, where he is currently an Assistant Professor. Felipe is the recipient of multiple research awards, including a Career Award at the Scientific Interface from the Burroughs Wellcome Fund and the NIH Director’s New Innovator Award.

Robert E. Guldberg is the DeArmond Executive Director of the Phil and Penny Knight Campus for Accelerating Scientific Impact and Vice President of the University of Oregon. Guldberg’s research is focused on musculoskeletal mechanobiology, regenerative medicine, and orthopaedic medical devices. Over his 25+ year academic career, Dr. Guldberg has produced over 280 peer-reviewed publications, served as an advisor and board member for numerous biotechnology companies, and co-founded six start-ups. He was previously executive director of the Parker H. Petit Institute for Bioengineering and Bioscience at Georgia Tech from 2009-2018. In 2018, he was selected from a national search to lead the Knight Campus as its inaugural permanent Executive Director, where he has led the creation of its strategic plan, hired faculty into the campus’ first building opened in 2020, and launched the University of Oregon’s first ever engineering degree program. In 2021, he led the launch of Phase 2 of the Knight Campus development with the announcement of a second $500 million gift from Phil and Penny Knight. At the national level, Dr. Guldberg is past Chair of the Americas Chapter of the Tissue Engineering and Regenerative Medicine International Society (TERMIS-AM). He currently serves on the Executive Leadership Council of the Wu Tsai Human Performance Alliance, a $220 million global initiative to promote wellness and peak performance through scientific discovery and innovation. Dr. Guldberg is an elected fellow of TERMIS, the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME), the American Institute for Medical and Biological Engineering (AIMBE), the Orthopaedic Research Society (ORS), and the National Academy of Inventors (NAI).

Ravi Kane is the Garry Betty/V Foundation Chair and GRA Eminent Scholar in Cancer Nanotechnology. He received a B.S. in Chemical Engineering from Stanford University in 1993. Also, he received an M.S. in Chemical Engineering Practice and a Ph.D. in Chemical Engineering from MIT, working with Bob Cohen and Bob Silbey. After postdoctoral research with George Whitesides in the Department of Chemistry and Chemical Biology at Harvard University, he joined Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI) as an assistant professor in 2001. He was promoted to associate professor in 2006, to full professor in 2007, and to the P.K. Lashmet Professor in 2008. He served as the head of RPI’s Howard P. Isermann Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering before moving to Georgia Tech in 2015. Prof. Kane has graduated 27 Ph.D students and contributed to over 130 scientific publications.

Raquel Lieberman is the Sepcic-Pfeil Professor of Chemistry & Biochemistry at Georgia Tech. Her research program focuses on biophysical and structural characterization of proteins and the impact of disease-associated mutations on function or dysfunction (e.g. aggregation). Rooted in basic research, the long-term goal of her research program is to convert mechanistic discoveries into disease-modifying therapies.

A major research project in her lab is investigations of glaucoma-associated herocilin, which has been funded by NIH since March 2011. Her lab has made major strides toward detailed molecular understanding of herocilin structure, function, and disease pathogenesis. They have divulged similarities between herocilin-associated glaucoma and other protein misfolding disorders, particularly aherloid diseases. Cumulatively, their work is leading to the first disease-modifying glaucoma therapeutic.

Lieberman also has a track record in membrane enzymes dating back to her thesis work where she solved the first crystal structure of the copper-dependent particulate methane monooxygenase. During her postdoc she shifted focus to intramembrane aspartyl proteases (IAPs), particularly those involved in neurodegenerative disease like Alzheimer’s disease. In her independent lab she developed new proteomics-based assays to measure IAP proteolysis. The lab also collaborates with physicists at Oak Ridge National Labs to use neutron scattering to probe structure and lipids in solution. This work has been funded by NSF and NIH.

She serves on the Executive Council of the Protein Society and as an academic editor for PLoS Biology. She also serves as co-PI of the Department of Education GAANN program in Biochemistry & Biophysics at Georgia Tech and on the advisory committees in a variety of capacities.

The research focus of Boris Prilutsky's laboratory is Neural Control and Biomechanics of Movement. They study how the nervous system controls hundreds of muscles and kinematic degrees of freedom of the body to produce purposeful motor behaviors and how the neural control of motor behaviors is affected by neural and musculoskeletal injuries.

T. Richard Nichols received the B.S. degree in biology from Brown University, Providence, RI, USA, in 1969, and the Ph.D. degree in physiology from Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, USA, in 1974. He is currently a Professor in the School of Biological Sciences at the Georgia Institute of Technology.,He is currently a Professor in the School of Biological Sciences at the Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, GA, USA.

Frank Rosenzweig is a Professor in School of Biological Sciences. He holds Bachelors degrees in Comparative Literature and Zoology from University of Tennessee-Knoxville, and a PhD in Biology at University of Pennsylvania. He carried out postdoctoral studies at the University of Michigan. He was a professor at University of Idaho, University of Florida, and University of Montana before joining the Georgia Tech faculty in 2016. He served as the Director of the NASA Astrobiology Institute funded center “Reliving the Past” from 2015 to 2019.  His research group studies the ecological and evolutionary forces that produce and preserve genetic variation using experimental evolution  to illuminate how genetic variation maps onto organismal fitness.

The Blazeck Lab tackles challenges at the interface of immunology, engineering, and metabolism to improve human health. We utilize our expertise in cellular and protein engineering to control biological function and to develop novel therapies to fight disease.

Synthetic Immune Systems

Our immune system uses very complex processes to make exquisitely specific receptors that recognize disease causing agents, and much of our ability to fight diseases is contingent upon the development of a diverse repertoire of immune receptors. Many questions remain unanswered about these immune receptors. For instance, at a population level, can we characterize the millions of receptors each person makes? And then further determine which of these millions of receptors is most important towards recognizing and targeting a pathogen? And can we control the generation of immune receptors to have desired properties? We are striving to answer these questions by harnessing our immune system’s power in a synthetic setting to improve understanding and treatment options for numerous diseases, while developing applications for vaccine design, personalized medicine, and enzyme engineering.

Engineering Cellular Therapies

Immunotherapies are treatments designed to modulate the immune response that have shown astounding clinical potential, yet there are no current treatments with guaranteed success. We are working to engineer cellular systems with controllable, enhanced, and non-native functions that improve their impact and capability. By developing high throughput technologies to interrogate immune function, we hope to translate our findings into improvements in the next generation of cellular therapeutics. 

Developing Proteins that Fight Cancer and Control Metabolism

It is widely accepted that cancer cells have a significantly altered genomic and metabolic makeup relative to normal cells, but how can we best target these differences? By combining our expertise in metabolism and therapeutic protein engineering, are working to engineer proteins to directly target and fight cancer. For instance, certain enzymes can control the metabolic environment around tumors to inhibit their growth or to stimulate a native anti-cancer immune response. We utilize directed evolution approaches to optimize protein function and efficacy.