OCTOBER 16, 2023

Three faculty have been selected as the inaugural cohort of the Washington Research Foundation – Ronald S. Howell Distinguished Faculty Fellowship

 

 

Sam Golden, Assistant Professor in the Department of Biological Structure, member of the UW Center for Excellence in the Neurobiology of Addiction, Pain and Emotion.

Dr. Golden leads a vibrant, productive, diverse and inclusive lab that integrates cutting-edge technologies including chemogenetics, optogenetics, calcium imaging, electrophysiological recording, and whole-mount light-sheet fluorescent microscopy to investigate the neural circuits guiding affiliative and aggressive social motivation in novel preclinical models of neuropsychiatric disease. He is an emerging leader in his field, having received prestigious young investigator awards, and he serves on several journal editorial boards. He is a committed and innovative mentor, focusing on his trainees’ academic and professional development as well as their wellness. He helps lead his department’s DEI efforts and his lab hosts underrepresented-minority high school and undergraduate students. Countless faculty and trainees have benefited from Dr. Golden’s strong collaborative nature and his expertise in microscopy and behavioral assays. His lab is a hub for light sheet fluorescence microscopy applications across the UW, and his novel open-source computational behavioral analysis platform, SimBA, is used widely.

Congratulation, Sam!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

SEPTEMBER 28, 2023

The George Gomori Award from The Histochemical Society

 

Dr. Denis Baskin, a Joint Professor Emeritus of our department, has been awarded the George Gomori Award from The Histochemical Society, which recognizes outstanding contributions to the field of histochemistry and cytochemistry.

 

Congratulations on receiving this honor Dr. Baskin!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

SEPTEMBER 22, 2023

Dr. Rachel Wong has been selected as the 2023 Boynton Lecturer

 

Rachel has made numerous contributions to vision science and has a stellar mentoring and training record.  She is currently Professor and Chair of the Department of Biological Structure at the University of Washington in Seattle. She was a Paul Allen Distinguished Investigator, and is a Fellow of the National Vision Research Institute, a recipient of the ARVO Friedenwald award and the B.B. Boycott Prize, and is a member of the National Academy of Sciences.

Rachel’s research centers on the development of the neural retina, using a diversity of tools including multi-electrode arrays, single-cell patch-clamp techniques, and advanced imaging. This combination has provided an unprecedented view of how the highly specific synaptic connectivity that subserves retinal function is established and maintained and how it reacts to damage. 

 

“Wiring specificity and plasticity of the vertebrate retina”
2023 Boynton Lecture: Saturday, Oct 7, 15:45

 

Congratulation, Rachel!

 

 

 

 

 

 

SEPTEMBER 20, 2023

Annual Biological Structure Retreat

 

Our department held its first in person retreat since 2019 on Sept. 14th at the Center for Urban Horticulture.  Again, gathered amongst the beautiful plantings and blissful gardens our department blossomed, featuring exciting talks by trainees, some fertile treats from the Diversity committee, and a great talk from Dr. Sheri Mizumori (Bio Str Retreat 2023).  Thanks to all who took the time to participate!

 

Thank you to the Retreat Planning Committee:

Golden’s lab members, Mitra Heshmati, Sam Golden

 

 

 

 

 

SEPTEMBER 7, 2023

Congratulations to the 2023-2025 Weill Neurohub Fellows

 

Congratulations to the 2023-2025 Weill Neurohub Fellows, Marina Pavlov (Reh Lab) and Carlee Toddes (Golden Lab)!  We are very proud to have you in our department and wish you every success!

 

Read about Weill Neurohub here

Carlee Toddes

Marina Pavlou

 

 

 

 

APRIL 28, 2023

Do people and monkeys see colors the same way?

 

Summary: Some nerve cells circuits for colour vision are uniquely human, shows a new study led by Yeon Jin Kim and Dennis Dacey from the University of Seattle Washington, and including Save Sight researchers Ulrike Grünert and Paul Martin. Using a fine-scale electron microscopic reconstruction method, they compared the connections of colour-coding receptor cells in the retinas of humans with two species of non human primates (macaque and marmoset monkeys).

They discovered that a short-wave sensitive (“blue”) cone circuit in humans is absent in marmosets, and is also different to the circuit seen in macaque monkey. The distinct connections of human retina may indicate recent evolutionary adaptations for sending enhanced colour vision signals from the eye to the brain. The study was published this week in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the USA.

 

Significance statement: Do humans and monkeys see colours the same way? In a collaboration with University of Washington in Seattle, Save Sight Researchers compared connections of colour-transmitting nerve cells in the eyes of humans and two monkey species. They found that nerve cells signalling short wavelengths (blue colours) in humans have connections that are absent in monkeys. The results imply that humans could perceive a greater range of blue tones than monkeys do.

 

UW Medicine Newsroom,  PNAS

 

 

 

 

 

FEBRUARY 3, 2023

SCIENCE IN MEDICINE (2022-2023 Lecture Series)

 

 

Title: “Enlisting Glial Cells for Self-Repair in the Nervous System:It’s
           Never Too Late”

 

When: 11 AM – 12 PM, Thursday, February 9, 2023

Where: Zoom link: zoom: https://washington.zoom.
us/i/92951758455 (official flyer)

 

Professor Tom Reh, Ph.D., Dept. of Biological Structure

 

 

 

 

JANUARY 19, 2023

REMEMBRANCE MESSAGE

 

Professor Dan Graney was a dedicated educator who taught Human Anatomy, Neuroanatomy, Histology and Embryology to generations of MD, MD/PhDs, DDSs, RNs and other healthcare professionals in Surgery, Ophthalmology, Urology and Bioengineering throughout the UWSOM and WWAMI. His undergraduate studies were at UC Berkeley, and he received a Ph.D. in Anatomy from UC San Francisco. In 1966, after completion of a post-doctoral Fellowship in Anatomy at the Harvard Medical School, he joined the faculty of Biological Structure in Seattle. His early research in Cell Biology emphasized the fine structure of intestinal epithelium. At the time of his retirement in 2013, he was teaching grandchildren of his early students.

Dan’s enthusiastic commitment to medical education was exceptional and recognized with numerous teaching awards. So many, in fact, that he became a Teacher Superior in Perpetuity and the University retired him from competing for further awards.

He was Director of the Willed Body Program for several decades, supporting thousands of students across the state in programs of Anatomical education. He became President of the American Association for Clinical Anatomists (AACA) and received the R. Benton Adkins, Jr. Distinguished Service Award, for his tireless efforts, locally, nationally and internationally to promote the highest level of Anatomical education through teaching and Anatomical research. He attributed much of his success to the support of his wife and sons, Carol, Steve and Don, and his motivation to his brothers, Jack, killed in the Korean War, and Don, killed while serving in Vietnam.  He mentioned how their sacrifice inspired his intense dedication to the education of healthcare professionals.     

Dan was very popular with students and known for well-organized lectures, closely linked to laboratory dissection. Few faculty can bring together the subjects of Human Anatomy, Neuroanatomy, and Embryology and connect them with examples of clinical medicine that students will see in their patients.

Dan’s light side came through in clinical anecdotes that were frequently based on experiences raising his family.  His endless supply of stories left students wondering how his children survived childhood. In lab, his dissection skills are legendary. He is still known as the “man with the golden scissors”. What students remember most about Dan Graney is his warm, reassuring style as a teacher. While the massive amount of information in Human Anatomy can seem overwhelming, even intimidating, he created a comfortable learning environment where students felt free to make mistakes, admit their concerns and seek his guidance with their intense studies.

Biological Structure appreciates Dan Graney for bringing scholarship and commitment to the educational missions of the Department in WWAMI and the UWSOM.  His achievements and their impact to the University and the State are highly significant. He will be missed greatly by his colleagues and friends in our department.   

Seattle Times Obituary:  https://obituaries.seattletimes.com/obituary/dr-daniel-graney-1086973794/

 

 

 

Professor Daniel O. Graney, Ph.D., Dept of Biological Structure

 

 

SEPTEMBER 19, 2022

APPLICATION FOR TRAINEE AWARDS

 

The goal of the William and Lucille Clark Fund is to create and support novel opportunities for development, implementation, and networking on innovative scientific research for trainees in the Department of Biological Structure.

William and Lucille Clark were committed to service and kindness. They believed that education contributes novel solutions to complex problems in society and health. The challenges in their lives included the great depression, World War II, and the death of their six year old son. The Clark Fund seeks to support promising projects that can assist with the success of future generations of scientists and educators.  It is a small attempt to honor their memory. 

Awards will help support graduate student and post-doctoral trainees in Biological Structure laboratories to participate in workshops, conferences, and programs that enhance and accelerate the research, education and professional experience in the basic science of biomedical problems and technology. Examples include Workshops at NIH on Computational Neuroscience; Summer courses at the Friday Harbor Laboratories; the Marine Biological Laboratory in Woods Hole, Mass; Cold Springs Harbor Laboratories in Cold Springs Harbor, NY; Gordon Conferences; or scientific collaborations where travel is necessary to conduct research at other institutions.

To apply, please click this link.

 

 

 

SEPTEMBER 14, 2022

Annual Biological Structure Retreat

 

Our department held its first in person retreat since 2019 on Sept. 14th at the Center for Urban Horticulture.  Gathered amongst the leafy plantings and blissful gardens our intrepid department blossomed from a Covid winter to some great science, featuring exciting talks by new faculty in both Biological Structure and Physiology and Biophysics, some fertile treats from the Diversity committee, postdocs at the peak of their growth, a grove of posters, and finally a beautiful talk from Dr. Beth Buffalo on how space and memory can intertwine in a theory of hippocampal function in the primate brain (Bio Str Retreat 2022).  Thanks to all who took the time to participate!

 

Thank you to the Retreat Planning Committee:

Vaibhav Thakur, Krystyna Wieczerzak, Susan Taylor, Yeon Jin Kim, Dennis Dacey

 

 

 

 

AUGUST 25, 2022

Dr. Kiara Eldred and Dr. Anna Bowen – Hanna Gray Fellows

 

Congratulations to Kiara Eldred and Anna Bowen, who have been selected as 2022 Hanna Gray Fellows of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI)! We are very proud to have you in our department and wish you every success!

Read about them and their research here (link)
Kiara Eldred, PhD
Mentor: Thomas A. Reh, PhD
Anna Bowen, PhD
Mentor: Nicholas Steinmetz, PhD

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

MAY 4, 2022

Dr. Rachel Wong is the recipient of the 2022 Friedenwald Award

 

 

Dr. Rachel Wong is the recipient of the 2022 Friedenwald Award from the Association for Research in Vision and Ophthalmology (ARVO). This achievement award honors outstanding research in the basic or clinical sciences as applied to ophthalmology.

The 2022 ARVO Achievement Award recipient page is available here: https://www.arvo.org/awards-grants-and-fellowships/arvo-achievement-awards/2022-arvo-achievement-award-recipients/.

 

Congratulations to Rachel!

 

Rachel O Wong,  Rachel Lab

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

FEBRUARY 7, 2022

NSF CAREER Award to the Steinmetz Lab!

 

Dr. Nick Steinmetz and his lab have been honored with the CAREER Award, which is the “most prestigious award in support of early-career faculty” from the National Science Foundation. The five-year award, titled “Distributed spatial neural dynamics”, is for approximately $1 million to support the Steinmetz Lab’s research on the coordination of activity across brain regions as well as the teaching and educational mission of the lab.

 

Congratulations to Nick and to his lab!

 

Nick Steinmetz,  Nick Lab

 

 

 

 

 

 

FEBRUARY 3, 2022

Dr. Levi Todd received new NIH/K99 award

 

 

Dr Levi Todd received a new NIH/K99 award.

This work will investigate how the neuroimmune response to retinal degeneration impacts the ability for retinal repair.

This project seeks to identify strategies to enhance retinal regeneration by modulating the immune system.

 

Congratulations to Levi!

Levi Todd, REH Lab

 

 

 

 

 

DECEMBER 20, 2021

Anatomy teaching faculty were delighted to get a sneak preview of the new anatomy labs in the Health Sciences Education Building.

 

 

Anatomy teaching faculty were delighted to get a sneak preview of the new anatomy labs in the Health Sciences Education Building under construction on Pacific Avenue. After decades of managing in cramped labs built in the 1960’s, we are excited at the prospect of teaching in a spacious new facility due to open in Spring/Summer 2022.

 

Pictured from left to right: Cat Pittack, Kurt Weaver, Kate Mulligan, Casey Self and John Clark.

 

 

 

 

 

NOVEMBER 18, 2021

Dr. Olivia Bermingham-McDonogh received an award for laboratory safety !

 

 

Dr. Olivia Bermingham-McDonogh received a 2021 Laboratory Safety Award (EH&S’s biannual 2021 Laboratory Safety Awards & Innovations Event).  This award is given to those labs that develop innovations designed to improve the culture of safety in laboratory spaces.

 

Congratulations to Olivia and her LAB!

 

Olivia Bermingham-McDonogh, OLIVIA Lab

 

 

 

 

OCTOBER 16, 2021

Professor Michele Basso, Ph.D. and her lab have joined the Department of Biological Structure!

 

 

We are very excited to announce that Professor Michele Basso, Ph.D. and her lab have joined the Department of Biological Structure.  Michele has a joint appointment in Physiology and Biophysics and is the new Director of the Washington National Primate Research Center.

The Basso lab focuses on understanding how the brain combines memory and sensory information to guide decisions and how these processes are impaired in diseases, such as Parkinson’s disease.

A very warm welcome to Michele, her graduate students Ye Hong and Vaibhav Thakur, and her postdoctoral scholar, Krystyna Wieczerzak!

 

 

 

 

 

SEPTEMBER 15, 2021

Annual Biological Structure Retreat with A Creative Department Logo!

 

 

Thank you to the Retreat Planning Committee:

Marielle Beaulieu, Ryutaro Akiba, Francisco Barros Becker, and Nick Steinmetz

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

JULY 1, 2021

Dr. David Raible has been appointed Virginia Merrill Bloedel Chair in Basic Hearing Science, and Professor in the Department of Otolaryngology-HNS, beginning July 1, 2021.

 

Dr. David Raible has been appointed Virginia Merrill Bloedel Chair in Basic Hearing Science, and Professor in the Department of Otolaryngology-HNS, beginning July 1, 2021. He will continue to have a joint appointment in Biological Structure.

 

 

David Raible, RAIBLE Lab

 

 

DEC 15, 2020

Dr. Levi Todd’s last publication is featured on the cover of Cell Reports!

 

Dr. Levi’s last publication is featured on the cover of Cell Reports (click)!

This paper explored an interesting issue of how microglia influence mammalian retinal regeneration, and it was found that microglia and neuroinflammation restrict neurogenic reprogramming of mouse Muller glia (read more)!

 

Congratulations to Levi!

 

Levi Todd, REH Lab

 

 

 

 

 

NOV 09, 2020

Dr. ERIC SZELENYI received a WRF Postdoctoral Fellowship!

 

Dr. Eric received a WRF (Washington Research Foundation) Postdoctoral Fellowship! He will develop genetic neurotechnology in combination with whole-brain imaging techniques to better understand the motivational circuitry underlying reward processing at UW.

Congratulations to Eric!

 

Eric Szelenyi, GOLDEN Lab

 

 

 

April 1, 2020

From crowd-sourced maps to virtual coffee dates, graduate students support the community during COVID-19

 

Kali Esancy, a former graduate student and current postdoc in the Neuroscience program, joined her friend in creating a crowd-sourced list of ways to help out in the Seattle area during COVID-19. This Google Sheets list includes dozens of funds to donate to, from the Seattle College Emergency Fund to the Seattle Restaurant Workers Coronavirus Rent Fund.

It also shares other ways to help the community, such as a list of restaurants to support that are owned by people of color in Chinatown and the International District and that offer food delivery. There are also links for donating pipette tips or face masks.

“I care about my community here, my friends and neighbors, and the idea of anything bad happening to these people hurts,” Esancy said. “I’ve always thought that being part of a community in any sense meant contributing to it in the ways that you can.”

For Allie Seroussi, there’s also an eagerness to share her time with others because as a grad student, she doesn’t have as much money to donate as a resource. While she has donated funds to service workers, Seroussi has also signed up to donate blood, offered to do childcare for UW Medicine employees, and signed up to help out through the Covid19 Mutual Aid – Seattle network.

But it’s not just food, money, or time students are helping each other with. Many are experiencing the loneliness that comes with social distancing as well as fear and anxiety about the future, and are looking for ways to connect and support each other.

Esancy used to get coffee on weekend mornings with fellow students from her cohort, but now the group has tried to keep the tradition by connecting via FaceTime while drinking tea, coffee, or hot chocolate in their own homes. She has also heard of students forming accountability writing groups while others are signing up for online board game platforms like Discord that include chat or voice features to talk to their friends. Esancy is brainstorming how to connect with her peers from circus class for virtual workouts, perhaps through platforms like Zoom.

When it comes to anxiety about how this will affect academics and career goals, Esancy tries to think about it like a scientist.

“Science is replete with catastrophes big and small–sometimes hard drives or computers fail and you lose a lot of data, sometimes months of experiments don’t work or have to be repeated, sometimes the crucial piece of equipment you need is out of commission for months, etc.,” Esancy said. “From what I’ve seen amongst my peers, graduate students are pretty resilient from dealing with those ordinary catastrophes that put a damper on their work, so maybe reminding themselves that they have the resiliency to get through this too would be helpful.”

Kali Esancy, DHAKA Lab

By Kate Stringer

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Dr. Dennis Dacey received a new NIH funded award entitled, The Human Foveal Connectom

 

The award is to use volume electron microscopy – connectomics – to characterize the detailed microstructure of the circuitry and critical non-neuronal support cells of the human fovea. Dr. Christine Curcio (a Biological Structure alumnus) at the University of Alabama, Birmingham, and Dr. Andreas Pollreisz, at the Medical University of Vienna, who have done pioneering work on diseases of the macula are the major collaborators on the exciting new project.

Congratulations to Dennis!

 

Dennis M Dacey,  Dennis Lab

 

 

 

 

 

 

Dr. Chi Zhang received new NIH/K99 award titled, ” Wiring specificity and plasticity of rod and cone photoreceptor circuits”

 

Dr. Chi Zhang received new NIH/K99 award titled ” Wiring specificity and plasticity of rod and cone photoreceptor circuits”. One potential strategy to restore daylight vision in retinal repair is to transform rods into cone photoreceptors. Dr. Zhang has been awarded this Fellowship to study the circuitry and function of retinal neurons connected to photoreceptors with transformed identity.

Congratulations to Chi!

 

Chi Zhang,  Rachel Lab

 

 

 

 

 

 

May 27, 2020

Dr. Nick Steinmetz has been selected for two highly prestigious awards

 

Nick Steinmetz received a Klingenstein-Simons Fellowship in Neuroscience, which supports exceptionally promising young investigators engaged in basic or clinical research that may lead to a deeper understanding of neurological disorders. Nick has also been named a 2020 Pew Biomedical Scholar, the Pew Charitable Trusts program recognizes and supports outstanding early investigators in biomedical research. Nick’s lab explores how different brain regions cooperate to make decisions.

Congratulations to Nick!

 

Nick Steinmetz,  Nick Lab

 

 

 

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