Calcium regulation and the cytoskeleton: how does calcium control cell motility

Speaker: Professor Lisa Foa (University of Tasmania, Hobart)

Chair: Associate Professor Michael Piper

Professor Lisa Foa received her PhD from Deakin University, and as a student attended the “Neural Systems and Behaviour” course at Woods Hole.  There she learnt to assay growth cone navigation from Prof Mu-ming Poo, a technique that is still at the heart of her lab’s research today. She did her postdoctoral training in the labs of Kathryn Tosney (U. Michigan) and Hollis Cline (Cold Spring Harbor Labs, NY).  In 2001, Lisa moved back to Australia to take a research-teaching role at the University of Tasmania, where she established her developmental neurobiology laboratory.  The major focus of her lab is axon guidance and how calcium signals interact with the cytoskeleton to control growth cone navigation.  Recently her group has begun to collaborate with Dr John Lin, using novel optogenetic tools developed by his laboratory to manipulate calcium signaling and axon guidance. The aim is to not only use these tools to better understand mechanisms that regulate axon guidance and circuit development, but to also explore how optogenetics may be used in models of axon regeneration in vivo.  Her work has been supported by philanthropic sources and the NHMRC.