PhD research in the Joyner Lab, Developmental Genetics Program, Skirball Institute, NYU School of Medicine and Developmental Biology, Sloan-Kettering Institute , Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center
Project: Analysis of Sonic Hedgehog responding mesenchymal stem cells in the mouse prostate
May 2000-May 2002
Research Assistant, laboratory of Ted Abel, PhD, Department of Biology, University of Pennsylvania
Project: Development of novel reporter mice to visualize gene expression, in vivo, during learning and memory
2000
B.A. in Molecular Biology, University of Pennsylvania
Research Interests:
I am interested in stem cell biology and how developmentally important signaling pathways regulate stem cell behavior in the adult. In addition, I am interested in how aberrations in these signaling pathways can lead to cancer. The murine prostate is a model I have chosen because it can be induced to involute by castration and subsequently to regenerate by supplementation with exogenous androgens. Because this process can be repeated over 30 times in a single mouse, this regeneration is likely mediated by adult stem cells. Additionally, the prostate is a sight of significant pathology in humans, including prostate cancer and benign prostatic hyperplasia.
I have been using Genetic Inducible Fate Mapping (GIFM) to mark cells responding to the secreted factor Sonic Hedgehog and to follow the expansion of these Shh responding cells during prostate.
