5 minute read
NEW FACULTY
WHEN FACULTY FIRST ARRIVE AT THE SCHOOL OF BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES (SBS), THERE’S A LOT ON THEIR “TO-DO” LIST. IN ADDITION TO PREPARING TO TEACH CLASSES AND GETTING ASSIGNED COMMITTEES TO SIT ON, THESE RESEARCHERS SPEND MONTHS, EVEN YEARS, SETTING UP THEIR LABS, POPULATED WITH STUDENTS, STAFF AND POST-DOCTORAL RESEARCHERS. IT’S NOT UNLIKE LAUNCHING A START-UP.
GROWING STRONGELEINIS ÁVILA-LOVERA
Like all living things, plants have to respond and adapt to various stressors in their environment. But unlike most living things, plants must cope with these issues while being completely immobile. This stalwart resilience fascinated Eleinis Ávila-Lovera in her undergraduate years, an interest that has guided her entire educational journey as a plant ecophysiologist. Born and raised in Venezuela, she was drawn to desert regions and has since found her way in arid Utah as an assistant professor of the SBS.
It’s hard enough to weather the world while immobile, exponentially more so in the scorching heat with no water. And yet, countless plants are able to adapt and thrive in these conditions.
“There’s a particular genus called Parkinsonia (palo verde),” Ávila-Lovera explains when asked for an example, “whose bark is completely green. It’s a drought-deciduous plant, meaning that it loses its leaves during the dry season. In a desert this could lead to zero carbon gain, yet the palo verde is still able to withstand the arid heat because the green stem helps it continue acquiring carbon despite the lack of leaves.”
Plants such as these are the focus of Ávila-Lovera’s research, analyzing the benefits and drawbacks of stem photosynthesis in regard to drought tolerance. Taking inspiration from these adaptations, Ávila-Lovera wishes to create a classroom environment that provides students all the tools and resources they need to excel, to not just transmit information, but to provide the basis that allows them, in turn, to master and apply their newfound knowledge.
Having been encouraged to thrive by multiple mentors before her, Ávila-Lovera eagerly looks forward to providing a similar mentorship role to her current and future students.
GENE EXPRESSION IN NEURONSNICHOLAS VIERRA
“Brain neurons are highly specialized and differentiated,” says Nick Vierra, a newly arrived neurobiologist at the SBS. “They modify their function in response to experience. This is the fundamental basis of learning.” Vierra studies the cell body of neurons, a field that tends to be underrepresented in neurobiology.
We have a good understanding of how synapses work because people put in the hard and careful effort needed to make the tools to probe their biology. But this focus on synapses has caused the cell body to be overlooked. The Vierra lab is studying how protein machinery in the cell body translates signals from synapses and sends that message to the nucleus.
As a postdoctoral researcher, says Vierra, “I wanted to learn how to make and use antibodies correctly as tools. “Antibodies—proteins produced by the immune system that attach to foreign substances in the body—can be used incorrectly and produce misleading results. When we make antibodies, we take extra steps to ensure they’re generating bona fide results.” In this way antibodies can be harnessed to make powerful probes for discovering cell biology, for example, to determine where in the cell a particular protein resides.
Not surprisingly, perhaps, making tools leads to more questions to answer. Studying the cell body of neurons uses standard cell biology techniques, like live cell imaging, light microscopy, and electrophysiology.
“One of the challenges we face is that we don’t know the identity of many of the proteins functioning in the cell body that work to decode synaptic signals,” Vierra says. “A key approach we take is to identify them via protein mass spectrometry, so we know what these proteins are. This gives us a starting point to dissect the protein complexes we think are functioning to translate synaptic signals into a form recognizable by the cell.”
PLANT ECOLOGYLUIZA APARECIDO
Luiza Aparecido is a new assistant professor who studies plant physiology in response to a changing climate. Born and raised in Sao Paulo, her journey to this position at the U is the result of a lifelong passion for plants. “Ever since I was a young kid growing up in Brazil, I've always been interested in what plants are doing. That's always gonna be where my mind goes when it comes to the type of work that I do. I love plants very much, and I know that we need them, and their role in the ecosystem is very important.”
Aparecido earned her master's degree in tropical forest science working in the Amazon rainforest and then earned her PhD at Texas A&M, followed by a postdoctoral researcher position at Arizona State University. She became fascinated by arid land ecology, a surprising contrast to her roots in the tropical rainforest.
Her current research is crucial for understanding plant responses to heat and drought stress in urban landscapes like Salt Lake City. “There's so much we don't know about these plants that are unique and have adapted to these ecosystems—how they are going to look in the future, and if they are really as resistant as people think they are.”
Looking forward, Aparecido is excited to collaborate with the community of researchers at the U and continue to explore Utah’s unique plant ecology, as well as share her love for plants with her future students. Outside of the lab, she enjoys road tripping, hiking, and spending time with her dog, “Cookie.”
