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Using advanced imaging technology to study cells in three dimensions and real time, the Matsudaira laboratory has discovered new information about structures called podosomes, proteins that play an important role in cells� ability to move throughout the body. Because cell movement is critical to many life processes and plays a crucial role in the spread of cancer, understanding this process better will help scientists develop better therapies.
Matsudaira also investigates how cells store energy to cause movement. He and his colleagues are studying a unique cellular mechanism that works by storing energy on the principle of a spring, instead of burning fuel like a car engine. Understanding how this and other molecular engines work may yield new insights into critical cell processes.
The Matsudaira lab�s BioMEMS group borrows the best from biology, physics, and precision engineering to develop a new generation of tools that is reshaping how biology is done. Among its accomplishments, the BioMEMS lab has developed a device that makes DNA sequencing faster, more accurate, and exponentially less expensive. The chip-based device miniaturizes a process called electrophoresis onto a small glass chip. In operation, samples of DNA are injected in microchannels etched onto the chip�s surface, and an electrical current separates the DNA molecules based on their size.
In 2001, Matsudaira founded the Whitehead Institute-MIT BioImaging Center. The Center is based on the belief that complex cellular processes can best be understood by seeing with sophisticated imaging techniques, and then understanding the images through powerful computational methods. It has three major thrusts: cryoelectron microscopy of cellular structures, using a custom-built, remote-controlled cryroelectron microscope; multidimensional high-resolution light microscopy; and quantitative bioimaging bioinformatics.
A professor of biology and professor of bioengineering at MIT, Matsudaira was first appointed an Associate Member of Whitehead Institute in 1985. He earned a PhD in biology from Dartmouth College in 1981. He did postdoctoral research at the Max Planck Institute in G�ettingen, Germany, and at the Medical Research Council in Cambridge, England.
Selected Publications
Gardel, M.L., J.H. Shin, F.C. MacKintosh, L. Mahadevan, P. Matsudaira and D.A. Weitz. (2004). Elastic behavior of cross-linked and bundled actin networks. Science 304: 1301-1305.
Schmid, M.F., M.B. Sherman, P. Matsudaira and W. Chiu. (2004). Structure of the acrosomal bundle. Nature 431: 104-107.
Evans, J.G., Correia, I., Krasavina. O., Watson, N. and P. Matsudaira. (2003). Macrophage podosomes assemble at the leading lamella by growth and fragmentation. J. Cell Biol 161,697-705.
Mahadevan, L. and Matsudaira, P. (2000). Motility powered by supramolecular springs and ratchets. Science 288, 95-99. | 