Developmental & Molecular Pathways

The Developmental and Molecular Pathways (DMP) Group strives to better understand the molecular anatomy of disease by defining key developmental genetic pathways and drugable nodes in the “Wnt”, “TGF-beta”, “Hedgehog”, “Notch”, and “PI3K” pathways. Disruptions in these signaling networks can lead to many diseases. For example, the Wnt pathway is involved in cancer and bone loss, and the Hedgehog pathway is implicated in skin cancer, brain cancer and the regeneration of tissue.

The goal of DMP is to identify and validate novel targets (drugable nodes in the pathways) with a focus on five areas: tumor biology, stem cell biology (regenerative medicine), neuro/muscular degeneration, fibrosis and vascularbiology/immunology.

DMP’s capabilities in pathway analysis for target identification/validation include genomics, proteomics, model organisms,  high-throughput screening, computational biology and RNAi technology.

 

 

Selected publications

• Nicklin P.; Bergman P.; Zhang B.; Triantafellow E.; Wang H.; Nyfeler B.; Yang H.; Hild M.; Kung C.; Wilson C.; Myer V.E.; MacKeigan J.P.; Porter J.A.; Wang Y.K.; Cantley L.C.; Finan P.M.; Murphy L.O. Bidirectional transport of amino acids regulates mTOR and autophagy. Cell 2009 Feb 6;136(3):521-34.
• Young D.W.; Bender A.; Hoyt J.; McWhinnie E.; Chirn G-W.; Tao C.Y.; Tallarico J.A.; Labow M.; Jenkins J.L.; Mitchison T.J.; Feng Y.. Integrating high-content screening and ligand-target prediction to identify mechanism of action. Nature Chemical Biology (2008); 4: 59 - 68 Published online: December 9, 2007.
• Fishman M.C.; Porter J.A.. Pharmaceuticals: A new grammar for drug discovery. Nature (22 September 2005); 437: 491-493.