Signaling and transport across the membrane of immune cells
Membrane nanoarchitecture and trafficking. Heading link
THE PROBLEM: Our immune system evolves with constant exposure to threatening pathogens. But the immune system can malfunction with improper response to “self” molecules, as in autoimmunity, or the reaction can “go rogue,” as in the cytokine storm that has cost the lives of many COVID patients. At the heart of this problem lies the plasma membrane, which serves as gatekeepers of immune cells. We are broadly interested in deciphering how the spatial and temporal characteristics of membrane proteins regulate immune cell functions.
OUR APPROACH: The overarching goal is to dissect the membrane mechanisms using ultrasensitive imaging techniques. We employ superresolution techniques, including stochastic optical reconstruction microscopy (STORM), DNA-based point accumulation for imaging in nanoscale topography (DNA-PAINT), and our newly developed superresolution census of molecular epitope tags (SR-COMET, ACS Nano, 2021). We also develop statistical tools to extract the fingerprint information from the imaging data.