Alan D. Bender
Research Interests
Rho-type GTPases
Rho-type GTPases control the spatial organization of cytoskeletal and signaling proteins in eukaryotic cells. Our lab is using the yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae to investigate the following questions concerning Rho-type GTPases:
- What are their targets and regulators?
- How do they choose among different potential targets in different situations?
- How are they activated and localized to the appropriate places at the correct times in the cell cycle?
- How are the actions of different Rho-type GTPases coupled?
The tools that we use to address these questions are biochemistry, molecular biology, microscopy, genetics, and two-hybrid analysis.