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I believe that addressing fundamental questions in Biology requires the collaborative work of scientists from diverse backgrounds. In my lab we combine experimental and theoretical approaches to tackle open questions in evolution, cell regulation and network structure. We emphasize creativity and original thinking in our research and strive to establish an open and supportive work environment. We welcome collaboration with other groups and are establishing a open access maker-space to help other labs with a “hacker” mentality interested in engineer their own experimental platforms. 

Our lab studies the response of cellular networks to changing environments in health and disease. While the structure of regulatory pathways is studied extensively, far less is known about network re-organization under time-varying stimuli. Yet this under-explored dimension has broad implications – time-variant stimuli can culminate in extreme outcomes, from detrimental signaling catastrophes to anticipatory stress responses. We combine experimental and theoretical approaches to dissect network functionality and uncover its unique points of failure. We aim to exploit the network structure to therapeutically target subpopulations of diseased cells within a healthy host. 

We are looking for rotation students to visit our lab and participate in one of our ongoing research projects. Different aspects of the projects require different toolsets ranging from experimental biology to quantitative biology and mathematical modeling. Rotation students will have a chance to acquire new skill-sets and develop expertise required for implementing a quantitative approach for understanding cell regulation, signaling and evolution. Interested students should email Amir directly and briefly describe their academic background, future plans and interest in the lab.

Current rotation projects:

1. 
   Monitoring recovery dynamcis of melanoma cells in response to targeted therapy: The project involves examining and quantifying different aspects of cell behavior, population dynamics and adaptive resistance to targeted therapy. Rotation students will examine cellular behavior of established cell-lines and will clone and engineer new live-cell reporters for microscopy based assays.    


2. 
   Multiplexed tracking of MAPK activity in mixed yeast cell populations: During the project students will help developing a novel appraoch for tracking of MAPK activity in mixed cell populations growing in  microfluidics chambers. Work will expose rotation students to multiple steps in the research, from designing and cloing live-cell reporter in yeast to the quantitative analysis of the signaling dynamcis with automatic image analysis software.
   
    

We are currently looking for a postdoc fellow interested in developing as a researcher in Systems Biology. Applicants with background in any of the following fields are invited to apply - molecular and cell biology, bioinformatics, computational biology, physics and computer sciences. Interested applicant should email Amir and CC Lisa Koss. Please include an updated CV and a cover letter describing your experience, research interests and achievements. Please also have a letter of recommendation sent separately to Amir (additional letters may be requested later).