AMS Seminar: Jian Liu (JHMI) @ Whitehead 304

   
Title: Spatial-temporal modeling of mechanochemistry of cellular processes
Abstract: The central theme of Dr. Jian Liu’s research is to understand how mechanical actions feedback to biochemical pathways in cellular processes, and how such mechanochemical crosstalk among key cellular players governs spatial-temporal regulation and shapes cell functions. He confronts these challenges by bringing together theoretical and computational studies, rooted in statistical mechanics, with a diversity of biological experiments. His seminar will provide an overview of his current research interest – spanning the fields of cell migration, cell division, and membrane trafficking – with a particular emphasis on membrane shape-mediated excitability in cellular processes.
Biography: Dr. Jian Liu graduated from Peking University with a B.S. in chemistry in 2000 and earned his Ph.D. in theoretical chemistry from the University of California, Berkeley in 2005. He completed postdoctoral fellowships at the University of California, San Diego, Center for Theoretical Biological Physics from 2005 to 2007 and at the University of California, Berkeley, Department of Molecular and Cell Biology in the laboratory of George Oster from 2007 to 2009. Dr. Liu joined the NHLBI as a principal Investigator in 2010. Dr. Liu takes a distinct approach to theoretical biology, treating cellular systems as discrete functional modules comprising a set of critical players. This allows both simplification and retention of essential biological features. The larger goal of this modular approach is to allow for processes to be combined at a theoretical level to reveal the interplay among them in the cell as a whole.