Current Research and Scholarly Interests
We are focused on understanding the nature of bacterial genetic regulation. We use a variety of tools: gene expression microarrays, advanced techniques of fluorescence and electron microscopy, and a broad range of computational tools for bioinformatics and modeling.
The aquatic bacterium, Caulobacter crescentus, is our primary model organism. The members of the McAdams group include Electrical Engineers, Physicists, and Physical Chemists who are interested in biologically focused research. We work closely with geneticists and biochemists who are graduate students and postdoctoral fellows in Lucy Shapiro's group to bring a multi-disciplinary approach to the analysis of bacterial regulation and control.
Our interests range far beyond "conventional" approaches to genetic regulation to include the effects of dynamic spatial and temporal positioning of regulatory proteins and the regulatory effects working through the dynamic three-dimensional organization of the chromosome in the dividing cell. We are exploring how regulatory molecules are dynamically localized to particular cell positions and how this localization is integrated into the control mechanisms of the cell.