Principal Investigator Paul Barton
Co-investigator Douglas Lauffenburger
A collaboration with Douglas Lauffenburger’s laboratory focuses on cell migration, which is a key process in inflammation, wound healing, embryogenesis and tumor cell metastasis. Small peptide ligands such as epidermal growth factor (EGF) and fibronectin bind at surface receptors and can trigger a complex signaling cascade within the cell that may alter cell mobility or trigger cell division. We are developing better statistical methods that will allow us to understand and model how signaling molecules and other environmental stimuli affect macroscopic parameters of cell behavior such as movement and turning as a function of time. We are using Bayesian techniques to address the biggest challenge in this work, which is the development of good computational models that match the experimental system and can be used for experimental design and parameter estimation.