BPP Fall Seminar Series
November 12 | Dr. Wellington Muchero
Generalizable concepts in immune signaling across plant and human cells
Immune signaling plays an essential role in a multitude of fundamental biological processes including fertilization during sexual reproduction, cell proliferation, recruitment of symbionts, pathogenesis and parasitism in eukaryotes. Consequently, understanding the molecular basis of immune signaling has broad societal applications in managing fertility, prevention of cancerous cell growth, managing pathogens and parasites as well as engineering symbiosis to enhance organismal fitness. I will discuss the role of a single protein domain that occurs in highly divergent organisms and how it functions to modulate immune signaling across an unexpected range of biological processes in plant and human cells.
Biography
Dr. Wellington Muchero is a Quantitative Geneticist at Oak Ridge National Laboratory and holds Joint Faculty appointments in the Plant Sciences Department, the Bredesen Center for Interdisciplinary Research and Graduate Education at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville and the Oak Ridge Institute.
