(Image courtesy of Anushree Gulvady and the lab of Christopher Turner, PhD)
Turner
Gulvady
Cell and developmental biologists including Anushree Gulvady are studying how cancer invades and metastasizes at the cellular level. Gulvady is a doctoral student working in the laboratory of Upstate’s Christopher Turner, PhD. She works with Hic-5, a molecular scaffold that coordinates multiple interactions among proteins. Plasma membrane protrusions called invadopodia are seen reaching out from the red- yellow puncta. Gulvady’s project explores the mechanisms by which the invadopodia fuse together to form rosettes, the circular areas of red and yellow. The rosettes secrete an enzyme that helps degrade the extracellular matrix, which allows the cancer to spread. Understanding this process may help scientists develop ways to intervene.