NSF Postdoctoral Fellowship in Biology FY 2014

Mertz Aaron F, New Haven CT

Investigators

Abstract

NSF Postdoctoral Fellowships in Biology combine research and training components to prepare young scientists for careers in emerging areas where biology intersects with other scientific disciplines, in this case with physical science. The Fellows are expected to lead the nation's scientific workforce of the future. This fellowship to Dr. Aaron F. Mertz supports research on physical and molecular crosstalk underlying epithelial stratification in vivo, as well as training in mouse genetics, microscopy, and physical modeling. The host institutions for this fellowship are the Rockefeller University in New York and the Dresden University of Technology in Germany; sponsoring scientists are cell biologist Prof. Elaine Fuchs and physicist Prof. Stephan Grill. Educational outreach to under-represeneted groups includes mentoring college students with independent research projects through the Howard Hughes Exceptional Research Opportunities Program and involving underserved students from an economically challenged high school in New York City in Rockefeller's Science Outreach Day with lab tours and structured lab activities. How individual cells grow and move to achieve their final shapes and locations within tissues remains a challenging puzzle for both biologists and physicists. These processes are governed by a complicated set of biochemical and transcriptional changes within cells, as well as by active physical processes. Stratification of cells into multiple layers is an essential developmental process in all squamous epithelia, including epidermis, cornea, oral tissues, and esophagus; this distinguishes those tissues from simple, non-stratified epithelia, such as those of the gut. Unraveling both how stratification occurs at a biophysical level and how mechanics converges on the biology and genetics of epithelial tissue is required to explain how the skin becomes a barrier that retains fluids and protects an organism's surface against harmful microbes. This research explores how mechanical tension and viscoelastic properties of the epidermis play a regulatory role in epidermal stratification by actively generating physical characteristics that will affect cell shape, cell size, and proliferation rates. The research includes in vivo imaging and genetic transduction of mouse epidermis, physical perturbations with laser ablation, and modeling using theoretical physics. The goal is a correlated understanding of mechanical and biochemical mechanisms, which will offer new information about bi-directional crosstalk between the mechanics and biology of epithelial tissue morphogenesis.