New Damon Runyon Fellow selected for biophysics research
By Ryan Daugherty
Dr. Lindsay B. Case, a postdoctoral researcher in the Department of Biophysics at UT Southwestern Medical Center, has been selected as one of 19 new Damon Runyon Fellows. The Damon Runyon Cancer Research Foundation announced the national honor in late January.
Dr. Case, working in the laboratory of Dr. Michael K. Rosen, Chairman of Biophysics, is working to establish an in vitro experimental system to study the formation of integrin signaling complexes on model membranes. Integrins form multiprotein signaling complexes that are essential for the survival, growth, and migration of both healthy and malignant cells.
Integrins are proteins situated in the cell’s external barrier (the plasma membrane). Inside the cell, these integrins associate with many different proteins to form large signaling complexes. Outside of the cell, the integrins interact with molecules in the external environment.
Integrins play a critical role in cell movement, acting like the feet of the cell to transmit forces that help pull the cell forward. This process, called cell migration, is essential during embryonic development and is important for having a functional immune system as an adult.
“Unfortunately, cancer cells often hijack the process of cell migration in order to move away from primary tumors and spread throughout the body. Integrin signaling complexes are essential for the survival, growth, and migration of cancer cells,” Dr. Case said, “and integrins and their associated proteins are often mutated or misregulated in diverse cancer types.”
Dr. Rosen, who also serves as a Professor in the Green Center for Systems Biology, said, “Lindsay is everything one could hope for in a postdoc – smart, creative, driven, insightful, and simply fun to be around. This recognition of her graduate work with Dr. Clare Waterman and future potential is richly deserved. I am lucky and privileged to have Lindsay in my group.”
Dr. Case, who grew up in Rockwall near Dallas, graduated from Franklin & Marshall College in Lancaster, Pennsylvania. Her graduate studies were completed through a joint program offered by the National Institutes of Health and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and included work in the Laboratory of Cell and Tissue Morphodynamics with Dr. Waterman at the NIH’s National Heart, Blood, and Lung Institute. Dr. Case received her doctorate in cell and developmental biology in December 2015, and joined Dr. Rosen’s lab two months later.
The Damon Runyon Foundation, a non-profit organization focused on supporting innovative early career researchers, awarded nearly $3.5 million in 2016 to the 19 new Fellows and to its four Damon Runyon-Dale F. Frey Award winners. Each recipient is an outstanding postdoctoral scientist or physician-scientist conducting basic and translational cancer research in the laboratories of leading senior investigators across the country. The Foundation will provide $208,000 in independent funding over a four-year span to support Dr. Case’s work.
“It’s a wonderful honor to have been selected as a Damon Runyon Fellow,” Dr. Case said. “I’m grateful for the opportunity the fellowship provides for me to complete this exciting research project with Dr. Rosen at UT Southwestern.”
In her ongoing work, Dr. Case will elucidate the molecular interactions and physical mechanisms that regulate the assembly of integrin complexes to potentially reveal novel strategies for disrupting integrin signaling in cancer.
“I hope to develop an experimental system to study the regulation of integrin complex assembly,” Dr. Case said. “I am purifying the proteins thought to be involved in integrin clustering, and adding them to integrins attached to artificial model membranes.
“In order to better treat cancer, it’s important to understand the underlying cellular processes that lead to diseases,” she said. “With my research, I hope to understand the biochemical and biophysical regulation of integrin clustering at the molecular scale, because the behavior at the molecular scale is responsible for the changes in cell growth and migration seen at the cellular and tissue scale.”
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Dr. Rosen holds the Mar Nell and F. Andrew Bell Distinguished Chair in Biochemistry.
