Title: The Hippo Signaling Pathway – Function, Regulation, and Evolution

　　Speaker：Duojia Pan, PhD

　　UT Southwestern Medical Center

　　Time: July 24, 2024, 10:00-11:30 am

　　Venue: Youcai Deng Lecture Hall

　　Host: Dr. Jing Yang

　　Abstract

　　Dr. Pan has a long-standing interest in understanding the molecular mechanisms underlying growth control and tissue homeostasis. He earned a PhD at UCLA through the CUSBEA program and then had postdoctoral training with Dr. Gerald Rubin at UC Berkeley. Dr. Pan’s research has recently focused on the Hippo pathway, which controls organ size in all animals. Using Drosophila as a genetic model, his works have systematically decoded the key molecular components of the Hippo pathway, including its core kinase cascade, the downstream transcriptional machinery, and upstream regulators. Dr. Pan has further established a conserved role for Hippo signaling in mammalian tissue growth, regeneration, and tumorigenesis. For those landmark discoveries, he has been recognized as an investigator of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute and a member of the U.S. National Academy of Sciences.