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Guenter
Albrecht-Buehler
Title: Robert
Laughlin Rea Professor
Research area: Cell Communication and Behavior
Degree: Ph.D., Technical University, Munich
Voice: 312.503.4251
Fax: 312.503.7912
e-mail: g-buehler@northwestern.edu
Link to lab webpage: http://www.basic.northwestern.edu/g-buehler/cellint.htm
Detailed research description:
Considerable evidence suggests that tissue cells do not move randomly but
instead abide by well-defined rules of motile behavior. To understand the
motile behavior of cells during embryogenesis and malignant invasion, it is
necessary to identify cellular compartments and mechanisms that integrate the
numerous environmental and intracellular signals and control the motile
behavior of normal and malignantly transformed cells.
Our work during the past 18 years suggests that the centrosphere is the
cellular location of an integrative system that controls cell motility.
Recent approaches to the experimental test of the hypothesis included studies
of the specific organization of multiple centrospheres in baby hamster kidney
cell syncytia and the ability of mouse fibroblasts to detect near-infrared
signals from a distance of several cell diameters and to alter their motile
behavior in response.
Representative publications:
Altered Drug Resistance
of Microtubules in Cells Exposed
to Infrared Light Pulses: Are Microtubules the "Nerves"
of Cells? (1998) Cell Motility and the Cytoskeleton 40:183-
192
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