(3o) Biological Decision Making In Normal and Cancer Cells

Cancer is a disease of deregulated cellular decision making, and in the past few decades we have uncovered a myriad of biochemical molecules involved with such decisions. But how do observable biochemical events encode biological decisions such as proliferation and migration, and is such coding different between normal and cancer cells? How can we manipulate biochemical networks to rewire cell fate decisions? These questions lie at the heart of future research in my lab and will be the glue that holds together three main research areas:  (1) developing new and improving existing methodologies for how to construct, simulate, discriminate, and validate mathematical models of mammalian signaling and cell-fate decision processes such as those involved in transformation and progression to metastasis, (2) understanding the sources and controllability of biological noise, and the consequences of this noise for practical manipulation of signaling and phenotypes on single cell and population levels, and (3) generating predictive mathematical models of cellular signaling and cell-fate decision processes to enable rational design and control of natural and engineered biological systems. Our research will be applicable to many fields in medicine, where understanding how to manipulate mammalian cell fates is crucial for applications ranging from cancer to diabetes to stem cell therapy, and also biotechnology, where production of biologic pharmaceuticals by mammalian cell lines is becoming increasingly important. We will be one of the few labs in the world that combine cutting edge experimental biology with deep theoretical and computational research. This will be enabled by my unique expertise in both computational modeling and wet biology, which is a result of my PhD guidance from theorists Boris Kholodenko and Tunde Ogunnaike, and postdoctoral guidance from experimentalist Walter Kolch. This poster will first briefly describe my previous and current work, and then how this previous experience will enable me to lead the proposed future projects intended to germinate my independent research.