Carter, Ashley - Amherst College - Biochemistry-Biophysics

个人简介

Ph.D., M.S., University of Colorado-Boulder (2008) B.S., B.S.E., University of Michigan-Ann Arbor (2002) My interests lie in teaching a wide variety of students from different fields about physical principles. I especially enjoy topics in biophysics and optics. Previously, I have taught Physics 116 Introductory Mechanics, Physics 117/124 Introductory E&M, Physics 343 Dynamics, and Physics 400 Molecular Biophysics. To see what I am teaching now see my course list.

研究领域

The differentiation of tissues in complex eukaryotic organisms is a central issue in developmental biology. Genetically identical cells, descendants of a single fertilized egg, somehow develop diverse forms and functions as a result of tissue-specific expression of their genomes. My laboratory makes use of a particularly simple eukaryote, Dictyostelium discoideum, to study cell interactions and cell-specific gene expression. Dictyostelium amoebae exhibit an extraordinary life cycle in which one hundred thousand independent, starved cells coalesce into mounds, and then synchronously differentiate into just two cell types, spore and stalk. We employ a variety of approaches to questions of cell differentiation and pattern formation. Amoebae expressing foreign "reporter genes" such as GFP can be isolated and forced to develop under constrained circumstances to assess their developmental potential. The function of particular genes can be assessed by targeted gene "knock-outs" achieved by homologous DNA recombination. Some genes of particular interest to us participate in the ubiquitin-dependent pathway of regulated protein turnover; these may act by altering concentrations in the cells of the key signaling molecule, cyclic AMP. Techniques routinely used in the lab center upon gene cloning methodologies, the transformation of amoebae with foreign DNA, and the examination of expressed messenger RNA and proteins by quantitative RT-PCR, western blotting, and fluorescence. Enzymatic assays of the degradation of cyclic AMP are also performed.

近期论文

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1. Carter et. al.,"Precision Surface-Coupled Optical-Trapping Assay with One-Basepair Resolution," Biophysical Journal (2009). 2. King et. al.,"Ultrastable Atomic Force Microscopy: Atomic-Scale Stability and Registration in Ambient Conditions," Nano Letters (2009). 3. Carter et al., "Back-scattered detection provides atomic-scale localization precision, stability, and registration in 3D," Optics Express, (2007). 4. Carter et al., "Stabilization of an optical microscope to 0.1 nm in 3D," Applied Optics, (2007).