Daniel Starr
University of California-Davis, CA·Biology
Inside a cell, the nucleus does not just sit in place. It moves to specific positions during development, and sometimes it must squeeze through gaps narrower than itself, as immune cells and spreading cancer cells do.
- Fields
Biology
Genetics
Biophysics
- Topics
nuclear migration
nuclear positioning
LINC complex
- Grants
- 1 known grant, through Nov 2029
What they work on
- Test whether short and long isoforms of the KASH protein UNC-83 direct nuclear migration by favoring the kinesin-1 or dynein microtubule motors, using C. elegans genetics, live imaging and in vitro motor assays.
- Define how four parallel pathways (LINC complexes with dynein, FLN-2, peripheral heterochromatin and Cdc42/actin) deform and protect C. elegans P-cell nuclei as they squeeze through narrow constrictions, using forward genetics and live imaging.
- Test whether the giant KASH protein ANC-1 maintains endoplasmic reticulum shape through its spectrin repeats, which act as a scaffold for the ER.
- Measure how ANC-1, LINC complexes, lamins and ribosomes control cytoplasmic crowding in C. elegans tissues by tracking the diffusion of genetically encoded nanoparticles (GEMs).
More about the research
This work asks how cells move and reshape their nuclei, and how the same molecular machinery shapes the physical properties of the surrounding cytoplasm. The focus is on LINC complexes, protein bridges that link the nucleus to the cell's internal skeleton. They are formed by KASH proteins in the outer nuclear membrane and SUN proteins in the inner membrane. SUN proteins also connect to lamins, the meshwork lining the nucleus, and to chromatin.
Why it matters
Mutations in LINC complex components are associated with muscular dystrophies, neurological disorders, Progeria, aneurysms, hearing loss, infertility and cancer. Understanding how these proteins position nuclei and control the physical state of the cytoplasm could reveal the molecular basis of these diseases. It could also clarify how nuclei squeeze through tight spaces during immune responses and cancer metastasis.
Known grants
From NIH and NSF research grants. Labs often have other funding we can't see.
Closest labs
Beat Vogeli
University of Colorado Denver/Anschutz Medical Campus, CO·Biophysics
Determine how the dynein light intermediate chain (LIC), a flexible disordered region, works with cargo-specific adaptor proteins and phosphorylation to let a single cytoplasmic dynein carry many different cargoes, using NMR and other biophysical methods.
Jayakrishnan Nandakumar
University of Michigan, MI·Biochemistry
Reconstitute the shelterin proteins of the worm C. elegans outside the cell and determine their structures, to learn how its simpler version of this chromosome-end-protecting complex binds telomeric DNA.
Anna Sokac
University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, IL·Biology
Test whether measurable features of transcription of five actin-regulator genes explain the even, synchronized timing of cellularization in Drosophila embryos, using live imaging of mRNAs down to single molecules.
The school
University of California-Davis: 49 labs on PI Pages, $1.0B a year on research, 647 research doctorates a year.
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