Research Interests

As a graduate student in biochemistry, I am primarily interested in examining the mechanisms by which cellular signals are propagated in regulating gene expression programs. In light of our knowledge regarding the function of various kinases, phosphatases, ubiquitination, transcription factors and chromatin remodeling events, one cannot help but ask the question: with approximately 25,000 human genes and only a handful of signal transduction pathways, what signaling mechanisms exist to ensure specificity in gene expression?

As mammalian cells respond to extra- and intra-cellular signals, environmental and metabolic stresses, and pathogens, each unique signal is processed to elicit specific gene expression programs that will determine an organisms development, survival/cell death decisions, or activation of the immune response. This gene expression is stimulus-specific; however, it has become increasingly clear that often the same signaling molecules and transcription factors are involved in transmitting signals from different receptors to the nucleus. Different signaling pathways may coordinately act to ensure that specific sets of genes are induced. In other words, transcriptional control of gene promoters requires the activity of multiple transcription factors, co-activators, and chromatin remodeling events. These cooperative interactions imply the need for temporal synchrony of different pathways that regulate a particular gene promoter. Thus, what mechanism guarantees specificity and such synchrony? How do cells compute the correct response (output) given a set of stimuli (input)? To investigate such questions, my project seeks to understand how stimulus-specific temporal control within individual signal transduction pathways, such as the NF-kB pathway, provides a mechanism by which differential gene expression programs are elicited.

Publications