Current Lecture Season

All lectures will be in person in Lipsett Amphitheater, Building 10, from 2:00 to 3:00 p.m. ET (new time) with remote viewing at https://videocast.nih.gov.

Sign up for the WALS listserv to receive notices about each lecture.

WALS 2024–2025 WALS Season season poster

Of Flies and Men – Harnessing the Power of Drosophila to Decipher the Molecular Mechanisms of Neurodegeneration

Daniela Zarnescu, Ph.D.
Penn State College of Medicine

The Zarnescu Laboratory studies the molecular mechanisms of aging and neurodegenerative diseases with a focus on RNA processing and cellular metabolism. We use a combination of molecular, genetic, bioinformatic and pharmacological tools, and a diverse array of experimental models, including fruit flies, cultured cells and patient tissues. We also seek to develop therapeutics for neurodegenerative disorders. I will present our recent findings on modelling TDP-43 proteinopathies in ALS and FTD relevant circuits with a focus on metabolic, synaptic and signaling targets.

Dissecting Neurobiological Mechanisms of ASD: From Genes to Circuits

Guoping Feng, Ph.D.
Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Human genetic studies have identified a large number of risk genes for autism spectrum disorder (ASD), many of which encode synaptic proteins, suggesting that synaptic dysfunction is a key pathology in ASD. Using a variety of animal models, we have identified distinct synaptic and circuitry mechanisms related to repetitive behaviors, social interaction deficits, sensory abnormalities.

Mechanisms of Ovarian Aging: A Target for Geroprotection in Women

Yousin Suh, Ph.D.
Columbia University, Department of Genetics and Development

The ovary is the first organ to undergo early-onset aging in the human body, with profound consequences for both fertility and overall health in women. However, the biological mechanisms driving ovarian aging remain poorly understood. To understand the molecular, cellular, and genetic basis of ovarian aging in humans, we performed integrative single-nucleus multi-omics analyses of young and reproductively aged human ovaries, uncovering coordinated changes in gene regulation across all ovarian cell types.

Navigating Uncharted (Neuroimmune) Waters

Jonathan Kipnis, Ph.D.
Washington University in St. Louis, Department of Pathology & Immunology

The brain, long considered an immune-privileged organ, is continuously surveyed and maintained by intricate clearance systems. Recent discoveries have reshaped our understanding of brain homeostasis, revealing essential roles for meningeal lymphatic vessels and glymphatic pathways in facilitating waste removal, fluid balance, and immune communication. In this lecture, I will discuss how the lymphatic and glymphatic systems cooperate to maintain brain health across the lifespan — and how their dysfunction contributes to aging and disease.

The Interface between Metabolism and Immunity within a Virus Microenvironment

Ileana M. Cristea, Ph.D.
Princeton University

George Khoury Lecture

Viral infections spread within complex and dynamic cellular microenvironments that shape the outcome of infection. As such, intra-cellular communication cascades, as well as communication between infected cells and cells in the surrounding tissue create a virus microenvironment. Here, we will describe some of our efforts to characterize communication at the intra- and inter-cellular levels.

Immunology From First Principles

Ruslan Medzhitov, Ph.D.
Yale School of Medicine

William E. Paul Lecture

The lecture will discuss allergic immunity – role of the environment in allergic sensitization, differences of allergic immunity with antimicrobial immunity, and the role of neuro-immune interactions in allergies. He will also discuss ecological perspectives o the biological functions of allergic defenses and possible roles of the rise of allergic diseases. Finally, he will discuss the role of antigen exposure and antigen cross-reactivity in protection and susceptibility to allergic diseases.

 Learning Objectives:

*Postponed*- The Emotional Brain: Role in Depression and Addiction

Huda Akil, Ph.D.
Michigan Neuroscience Institute, University of Michigan

Huda Akil is a Syrian-American neuroscientist whose research has contributed to the understanding of the neurobiology of emotions, including pain, anxiety, depression, and substance abuse. Akil and her colleagues are best known for providing the first physiological evidence for a role of endorphins in the brain and demonstrating that endorphins are activated by stress and can cause pain inhibition.

Mechanisms and Meaning for Smell

Sandeep Robert Datta, M.D., Ph.D.
Harvard Medical School

Nearly all animals depend upon smell to usefully interact with the world. Although underappreciated, smell is also critical to humans, as patients with olfactory loss face substantial additional risks for injury, psychiatric disease, and death. However, smell remains a mystery — we know little about how odor information is organized in the brain, and even less about how odors are linked to perception. Here I review the canonical mechanisms thought to enable olfaction, and discuss recent surprises that are revising our ideas about how our sense of smell might work.

Bioorthogonal Chemistry: The Journey from Basic Science to Clinical Translation (2023–2024, rescheduled 2024-2025)

Carolyn Bertozzi, Ph.D.
Howard Hughes Medical Institute & Stanford University

Margaret Pittman Lecture

Carolyn Bertozzi is the Anne T. and Robert M. Bass Professor of Chemistry and Professor of Chemical & Systems Biology and Radiology (by courtesy) at Stanford University, the Baker Family Director at Sarafan ChEM-H, and an Investigator of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute. She completed her undergraduate degree in Chemistry from Harvard University in 1988 and her Ph.D. in Chemistry from UC Berkeley in 1993. After completing postdoctoral work at UCSF in the field of cellular immunology, she joined the UC Berkeley faculty in 1996.

This page was last updated on Tuesday, August 20, 2024