Seth Blair
Credentials: Integrative Biology Department
Position title: Development and signaling in Drosophila
Email: ssblair@facstaff.wisc.edu
Phone: (608) 262-1345
Address:
315 Zoology Research Building
1117 W Johnson St
Madison, WI 53706
LAB WEBSITE:
FOCUS GROUPS:
Developmental Biology & Regenerative Medicine; Cell Adhesion & Cytoskeleton
RESEARCH DESCRIPTION:
We are currently pursuing two main avenues of research, both centered around the development of the wing of the fruitfly, Drosophila melanogaster. First, we have been examining general aspects of pattern formation and cell lineage within the developing imaginal discs, the structures that give rise to the wing and notum. We have been concentrating upon the role of the lineage “compartments” and transcompartmental induction in specifying the basic axes of appendages, and the mechanisms by which both transcompartmental signaling (especially via the Hedgehog and Notch pathways) and the compartmental lineage restrictions are maintained. Second, we have been examining mutations that affect wing patterning as a means of uncovering novel players in cell signaling and signal transduction pathways. We are currently concentrating on signaling via the protocadherins Dachsous and Fat and their roles in proximodistal patterning, planar cell polarity and growth control, and especially how that signaling is transduced by the intracellular domain of Fat. We have also recently worked on the role of the secreted and cytoplasmic proteins in the regulation of BMP, Hedgehog and Wnt signaling.
ALSO A TRAINER IN THE FOLLOWING PROGRAMS: Genetics, Neuroscience Training Program (NTP), Zoology