UTSW joins with other scientists nationwide to celebrate Molecular Biology’s 30th anniversary
More than 800 scientists gathered recently for a symposium marking the 30th anniversary of UT Southwestern’s Department of Molecular Biology, known for so many notable discoveries over the years. Attendees included UTSW faculty, students, staff, alumni, and guests from other institutions.
The event celebrated the Department’s founder and Chair, Eric Olson, Ph.D., also Professor of Molecular Biology, and its remarkable group of scientists. The Department is recognized worldwide for its studies in developmental biology and intracellular signaling as well as for discovering the role of the molecule cGAS in turning on an immune response. Other key areas of research include stem cell differentiation and RNA biology.
“The true legacy of this Department is exactly what it should be: the discoveries and the substance of the science that have been carried out by its faculty working alongside graduate students and postdocs,” Daniel K. Podolsky, M.D., President of UT Southwestern, said at the start of the conference, before handing the lectern over to an array of prominent UTSW scientists and guests.
Recruiting a leader
The April 10 event began with a humorous look back at the somewhat unorthodox beginnings of the Department. UT Southwestern President Emeritus and surprise guest speaker Kern Wildenthal, M.D., Ph.D., shared that Dr. Olson was working at M.D. Anderson in 1995 and about to leave for a Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI) Investigator position at Duke University. But UTSW leaders, led by William B. Neaves, Ph.D., wanted his investigator talents and leadership abilities to remain in Texas.
“We had a group here who decided, ‘Well, this just can’t happen. We have to do a full-court press to recruit Eric to Dallas,’” Dr. Wildenthal said.
What they offered Dr. Olson was a new department, the Department of Molecular Biology, with him at the helm. He could hire his dream team, comprised of scientists who could make a mark for UTSW.
They were successful in luring Dr. Olson, but once he was on board, it was a maneuver of a more personal nature that ensured the new Chair would remain at UT Southwestern, Dr. Wildenthal joked. “Willie Nelson did a benefit for the Medical School. Next to science, Eric’s passion is music. With a Willie Nelson Professorship available, we appointed Eric to that and we knew he would never leave,” Dr. Wildenthal said.
Thirty years after its unusual beginning, the Department is known for its culture of commitment to discovery in the field of molecular biology, which is the study of the structure and operation of proteins and other macromolecules that are part of living organisms. Housed on UT Southwestern’s North Campus, the Department is composed of 18 labs in state-of-the-art facilities.
The ‘art’ of science
Nobel Laureate Joseph L. Goldstein, M.D., Chair of Molecular Genetics and one of those who helped bring Dr. Olson to UT Southwestern, then gave a presentation warmly comparing Dr. Olson’s contributions and journey in science to those of the 19th-century Dutch artist Vincent van Gogh.
Dr. Goldstein spoke of crucial moves during both of their careers, their bursts of creativity, and the long shadows and impact they cast upon their fields.
“In his years as Department Chair at UT Southwestern, Eric has been an inspired leader who has assembled an exceptional group of scientists. Even though Eric himself turned down an HHMI position, there are four members of his Department who are HHMI Investigators.”
After the look back, the symposium turned to its focus: research. Fourteen investigators – 10 UTSW scientists and four researchers from other leading institutions – spoke about their work.
Leading researcher credits UTSW
President of Gladstone Institutes, Deepak Srivastava, M.D., who had come to UT Southwestern with Dr. Olson in 1995, was the first researcher to talk about his work.
One of the most satisfying story arcs of his career began during his time in Dallas. A pediatric cardiologist, Dr. Srivastava is interested in heart valve disease, including calcific aortic valve stenosis, or hardening. Through a patient at Children’s Medical Center Dallas, Dr. Srivastava learned of a family with a genetic defect in the NOTCH1 gene that led to a particular heart valve defect and eventual stenosis of the aortic valve. Eventually he found a drug that could correct this defect in a mouse model and in human cell lines.
Although the NOTCH1 defect accounts for only about 5% of aortic valve stenosis, “We think we have a drug that could apply not only to people with this mutation but also generally with aortic calcification,” Dr. Srivastava said.
“I left UT Southwestern 20 years ago, in 2005, with all of my scientific heroes here,” Dr. Srivastava noted.
UTSW scientists impacting research
Ondine Cleaver, Ph.D., Professor of Molecular Biology, told those gathered about her work studying the formation of biological tubes in embryos.
“Our lab is interested in how organs arise and develop coordinately with their vasculature. We study how tubes as a unit of tissue are formed, not only blood vessels but also epithelial tubes, such as those found in the pancreas, kidneys, and lungs,” said Dr. Cleaver, who also talked about this work at a recent President’s Lecture Series in April.
Dr. Cleaver said her team found that the gene Rasip1 is essential for the development of blood vessels. If Rasip1 is knocked out, i.e., removed from the cells of an embryo, a functional vasculature will not form. Rasip1 is also required for continued expansion of blood vessels via sprouting. The lab found that the protein Afadin plays a similar role to Rasip1’s in the development of tubules in the pancreas. Researchers discovered that biomechanical forces, such as blood flow, are essential for blood vessel maintenance.
“Twenty people die every day awaiting transplants. It is the goal of our group to make organs in a dish with a functional vasculature, for transplantation into patients – that’s our pie in the sky goal,” Dr. Cleaver said.
Elizabeth Chen, Ph.D., Professor of Molecular Biology and Cell Biology, spoke about her work with cell-cell fusion, which began when she was a postdoc in the Olson Lab. Through a large-scale genetic screen in the fruit fly Drosophila, she identified many genes required for muscle cell fusion.
She moved to Johns Hopkins, where her lab unexpectedly discovered that cell-cell fusion in Drosophila is an asymmetric process with one of the two joining cells sending out invasive protrusions. After returning to UTSW, her lab showed that the same process also occurs in vertebrates.
Since cell-cell fusion is involved in a variety of developmental and physiological processes, such as fertilization, myogenesis, muscle regeneration, immune response, bone resorption, and placenta formation, understanding how it works has general implications for treating various human conditions.
The final scientist to speak was Zhijian “James” Chen, Ph.D., Professor of Molecular Biology and Director of the Center for Inflammation Research, who talked about his lab’s discovery of the DNA-sensing enzyme, cGAS, which senses foreign DNA and triggers the body’s innate immune response. Dr. Chen won the Albert Lasker Basic Medical Research Award in 2024 for his work on cGAS.
He spoke at the symposium about the role of cGAS in senescence and aging. A hallmark of aging is low-grade, chronic inflammation, so the lab hypothesized that reducing the activity of cGAS, which turns on inflammatory responses, would help with diseases of aging. Using mice treated with a cGAS-inhibitor in their drinking water, the lab was able to alleviate inflammation associated with aging. Aberrant activation of cGAS has also been linked to other diseases, including lupus, Alzheimer’s disease, and atherosclerosis.
The members of UT Southwestern’s Department of Molecular Biology have earned myriad honors recognizing their achievements over the years. The group includes four HHMI Investigators, four members of the National Academy of Sciences, and two members of the National Academy of Medicine
“The Department of Molecular Biology has elevated the reputation of UT Southwestern thanks to the vision and leadership of Eric Olson,” Dr. Podolsky said.
Reflecting on his decision to join UT Southwestern rather than the more obvious choice of joining Duke University in his home state of North Carolina 30 years ago, Dr. Olson read the Robert Frost poem “The Road Not Taken”:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I —
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.
More symposium photo highlights
Endowed Titles
Dr. “Zhijian” James Chen holds the George L. MacGregor Distinguished Chair in Biomedical Science.
Dr. Cleaver holds the Lee Fikes Chair in Biomedical Sciences.
Dr. Goldstein, a Regental Professor, holds the Julie and Louis A. Beecherl, Jr. Distinguished Chair in Biomedical Research and the Paul J. Thomas Chair in Medicine.
Dr. Olson holds the Pogue Distinguished Chair in Research on Cardiac Birth Defects, The Robert A. Welch Distinguished Chair in Science, and the Annie and Willie Nelson Professorship in Stem Cell Research.
Dr. Podolsky holds the Philip O’Bryan Montgomery, Jr., M.D. Distinguished Presidential Chair in Academic Administration and the Charles Cameron Sprague Distinguished Chair in Biomedical Science.