We would like to congratulate James for his work on the protein Sirtuin 5. His poster, “A Novel Role for the Tumor-Promoting Sirtuin SIRT5 in Regulating Ribosomes” was awarded a poster prize at this year’s BBS Symposium.
New Research Opportunity for Undergraduate Students in Animal Health
Dr. Katt, in collaboration with Dr. Santiago Peralta of the Cornell Veterinary College, has begun a new project examining oral cancers in canine patients seen at Cornell. Oral cancer is a challenging target with high unmet need, and need is especially high in companion animals, where treatment options are very limited. This project, supported by the Cornell Canine Health Center, focuses on generating model systems of canine oral cancers, and using these models to test potential therapeutic approaches to the disease.
As part of this project, we are looking to recruit one or two motivated undergraduate students. The ideal candidate will have completed at least some basic laboratory coursework, enjoy working on a multi-investigator, multi-disciplinary project, and have at least two days per week in which they could spend 2-3 hours conducting laboratory work. Please contact either Dr. Katt or Dr. Cerione if interested.
Cerione laboratory welcomes Cody Aplin
Cody Aplin received his BA (2018) and MS (2020) in Chemistry from the University of Minnesota Duluth, where he used time-resolved fluorescence spectroscopy to study biosensors designed to respond to environmental conditions such as ionic strength and macromolecular crowding. His research interests in the Cerione laboratory include the dynamics of protein complex formation in the visual phototransduction cascade, and developing new approaches for structurally characterizing membrane proteins in their native lipid environments.
Yangyang Liu Begins Graduate Career
We are happy to welcome Yangyang Liu to the Cerione research group. Liu received her B.S. degree in Chemistry and Astrophysics at University of Wisconsin - Madison in 2019 and is now a graduate student with the Department of Chemistry and Chemical Biology at Cornell. Her main research interests are in studying how extracellular vesicles (EVs) contribute to cancer progression and understanding the mechanism driving the formation and transport of EVs.
Recognition of achievements in vision
Dr. Ram (Sekar) Rachandran has been awarded a grant from Foundation for Ophthalmology Research and Education--International (FORE-I) for his work on the vertebrate vision system. Ram is a key driver in the Cerione laboratory’s investigations of mammalian vision, and this funding will enable him to explore exciting new directions in this work.
Shi Feng joins Cerione research group
We are happy to welcome Shi Feng to the Cerione research group. Feng comes to use from Southeast University（东南大学), Nanjing, China, and will be a joint student with Prof. Brian Crane. He has already begun to study the enzyme liver glutaminase via new Cryo-EM techniques, and will continue studying this and other important systems during his graduate studies.
Dr. Michael Lukey takes position at Cold Spring Harbor
It is with sincerely mixed emotions that we bid farewell to Dr. Michael Lukey, who has accepted a position at Cold Spring Harbor. Dr. Lukey first joined the lab in 2011, and made his mark through a number of important studies pertaining to the glutaminase enzymes. Michael was known in the laboratory as much for his rigorous and detailed approach to science as for his late-night experimental sessions. Michael discovered that glutaminase enzymes were regulated by the transcription factor c-Jun, and went on to help show that liver glutaminase, which was generally thought to be an anti-cancer factor, was actually pro-oncogenic in receptor positive breast cancers. Michael was tremendously productive during these studies and others, and we wish him the very best of luck in his new position.
Elena Panizza wins poster award
At the second annual Cornell Cancer Research Symposium, held at the Cornell Veterinary College, Elena Panizza was awarded a poster prize for her work examining the protein content of extracellular vesicles. The Cornell Cancer Research Symposium poster prizes are especially unique, because they are awarded not just for high quality science, but are based also on the ability of the researcher to describe that research to an audience of patients and cancer science advocates.
Major advance toward understanding mammalian vision
Image copyright Cell press.
Yang Gao and Ram (Sekar) Ramachandran’s work on the structure of the Rhodopsin-Transducin complex was published in Molecular Cell. This study was the culmination of more than 30 years of work by the Cerione laboratory on the mechanism of phototransduction responsible for vertebrate vision. Following this important study, Yang Gao has accepted an offer to pursue postdoctoral studies at Stanford University.
Passing of Dr. Jon Erickson
It is with the most profound sadness that we must say goodbye to our dear colleague, Jon Erickson, who passed on while doing something that he truly he loved – exploring the outdoors, hiking a wild trail in Oregon on a brisk autumn day. He is survived by his wife Amari and his daughter Kyle and son Owen. Jon was a member of the Cerione laboratory almost from its inception at Cornell, as he and Rick worked closely together for more than 30 years. Jon was a tireless and energetic researcher, having been instrumental in many of the most important discoveries in the Cerione laboratory, from the discovery of Cdc42 to more recent work on the vision system. Jon was indefatigable in his pursuit of interesting, important science, and he served as mentor to a number of graduate and undergraduate students, all of whom have gone on to promising careers of their own. But more than that, Jon was a good friend. Few of us could ever have asked for better. He will be sorely missed.