Dr. Fasil Abebe, Assistant Professor of Chemistry, has been awarded a grant from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to study and develop sensors for imaging copper in living human cells. His proposed research project, "Fluorescent Sensors for Subcellular Copper Imaging in Live-cells," is expected to total $438,502 over the period of September 6, 2019 through July 31, 2022.
Copper is a trace metal nutrient essential for most forms of life and is the third most abundant transition metal in humans. Though it is critical for several key physiological processes, unregulated levels of copper can induce oxidative stress and toxicity in cells. Either coper deficiency or copper over-load in the body is linked to various diseases, but the biochemical basis for the connection between an imbalance of copper and human disease remains unclear. Current measurement techniques lack the spatial and temporal resolution to adequately study the presence and activity of copper ions at the cellular and subcellular levels.
Dr. Abebe's research aims to address this problem by developing an efficient and environmentally friendly method of producing ratiometric fluorescent probes to optically detect and image copper ions in living cells. Access to real-time information on the quantity of copper ions at the subcellular level promises to spur significant advances in our understanding of cell biology.
