Welcome to the Palmer Lab at the University of Colorado Boulder!
Our research lies at the interface of chemistry and biology, where the application of chemical and physical principles provides a unique opportunity to better understand the fundamental biochemistry of living cells. Cells are complex entities that must integrate internal and external signals in order to coordinate diverse functions. Living cells are also dynamic, and this dynamism is key to understanding the mechanisms between cause and effect for biological processes. Deciphering the molecular details of how cellular constituents define healthy and diseased states, and how dynamics propagate from the cellular to the organismal level, is one of the great challenges in modern biology.
Our lab develops new technologies to interrogate signaling cascades in cells to understand how the actions of specific proteins, molecules, and ions contribute to cellular function. We combine in vitro spectroscopic and biophysical techniques with protein design and engineering to develop novel fluorescent probes, and use long-term time-lapse fluorescence microscopy to elucidate the mechanisms of cellular signaling pathways. Longitudinal single-cell analyses also allow us to explore the origins and consequences of heterogeneity in biological systems.
We are specifically interested in how cells regulate metal ions, how pathogens alter cell biology, and how to engineer improved photophysical properties in fluorescent proteins. To learn more about specific projects, please visit our research page.
We are committed to diversity, equity, and inclusion. In this lab we welcome people regardless of race, ethnicity, color, country of origin, religion, gender, sexual orientation, gender identity and expression, or disability status. We believe diversity promotes excellence, that the more our lab reflects the diversity in our society, the more innovative and creative we will be, and the more we will challenge conventional norms.
Last update: 09/21/2020
Lab News
1/2020-Undergrads Joe Kainov, Elnaz Navid and Sharee Dandridge join the lab. Sharee is a STEM-Routes UPLIFT Fellow. Welcome!
12/2020-Paper by Evan, Kelsie and Justin is published in ACS Sensors – progress in the development of vesicular zinc sensors
12/2020-Kelsie successfully defends her PhD. Dr. Anson will soon be off to a postdoc at Tufts.
11/2020-Kylie defends her undergraduate honors thesis and graduates magna cum laude with a degree in MCDB. Congrats Kylie!
9/2020- Amy gives a talk at Caltech’s virtual Frontiers in Chemical Biology symposium.
9/2020- We welcome two new undergraduate students: Mia Fox and Elnaz Navid.
9/1/2020- Another goodbye to a fabulous postdoc. Dr. Maria Lo takes a job as a scientist with Mosaic Biosciences.
6/2020- We bid farewell to Dr. Colin Rathbun who heads off to Dickinson College as an Assistant Professor of Chemistry and Dr. Evan Pratt who heads to Northern Michigan University as an Assistant Professor of Biochemistry. We will miss you and wish you the best of luck!
5/16/2020- Justin graduates with a degree in Biochemistry. This fall he will begin graduate school at Cornell, in the Biochemistry, Cell and Molecular Biology program (BCMB program). Congratulations!
4/27/2020- Justin receives his honors designation as summa cum laude!
4/14/2020- Kylie and Rita are both awarded UROP Fellowships for the summer!
4/10/2020- Justin successfully defends his Biochemistry honors thesis!
4/10/2020- Kelsie gives a guest lecture over Zoom!
4/7/2020- Sam Holtzen joins the lab! We’re excited to have you!
4/6/2020- Erin gives a talk at the Biophysics Supergroup!
3/31/2020- Palmer Lab has its first lab meeting by Zoom!
3/21/2020- Palmer Lab donates supplies to Boulder Community Hospital
3/20/2020- Erin passes her oral exams, and advances to candidacy!
3/18/2020- CU issues a work from home order in response to Covid-19
3/16/2020- Leah gives a talk at the Biophysics Supergroup!
3/9/2020- Sam Holtzen, a Molecular, Cellular and Developmental Biology graduate student, rotates in lab!
2/7/2020- Lara gives a Mostly Molecular Biology departmental talk!
2/4/2020– Maria and Leah’s paper: Single cell analysis reveals multiple requirements for zinc in the mammalian cell cycle is published in eLife!
1/16/2020- Maria gives birth to Julia Frances Lo, congratulations!
1/12/2020- Post-holiday lab party at Amy’s house, complete with white elephant exchange!
12/20/2019- Baby celebration lunch for Maria and JLo at Backcountry Pizza!
12/16/2019- Farewell brunch for Lynn at Southside Boulder Cafe!
12/1/2019- Colin accepts a position as Assistant Professor of Organic Chemistry in the Chemistry Department of Dickinson College! Congratulations!
12/5/2019- Amy hosts biochemistry speaker Andreas Gahlmann!
10/25/2019- Lab party at Amy’s house, complete with pumpkin carving!
10/20/2019- Philip Benson, an IQ Biology/Biochemistry graduate student rotates in the lab!
09/22/2019– Amy, Leah, Colin, and Erin travel to Janelia for two weeks of single molecule data collection at the Advanced Imaging Center!
09/18/2019– Esther travels to the University of Utah to present at the Rising Stars Symposium!
09/08/2019– Amy travels to Kyoto to present at the International Society for Zinc Biology meeting!
09/04/2019– Esther travels to Heidelberg for the EMBO Workshop Protein Synthesis and Translational Control conference!
09/03/2019– Esther travels to Hannover Medical School in Germany to give a talk at the Institute of Cell Biochemistry!
08/21/2019– Amy travels to La Jolla to present at the Methods and Applications of Fluorescence conference and attend the Roger Tsien Memorial Symposium!
08/19/2019– Lab barbeque to celebrate Mike and Lynn as newly minted PhDs!
08/19/2019– Lynn successfully defends her thesis! Congrats!
08/14/2019– Mike successfully defends his thesis! Congrats!
07/14/2019– Amy and Leah travel to Barcelona and Amy presents at the Cell Biology of Metals Gordon Conference!
07/07/2019– Kelsie travels to Palm Springs for the Protein Kinases and Protein Phosphorylation conference!
06/30/2019– Esther travels to Snowmass to present at the RNA Localization and Local Translation FASEB conference!
06/28/2019– Lynn’s paper “Intracellular Zn2+ transients modulate global gene expression in dissociated rat hippocampal neurons” is published in Scientific Reports!
06/18/2019– Ice cream for Lynn’s paper acceptance at Sweet Cow!
06/10/2019– Kelsie teaches a two-week chemistry course for high schoolers in the Dream Big Precollegiate Program!
06/05/2019– Amy travels to NIH for the High Risk, High Reward Symposium!
06/03/2019– Kylie and Rita join the lab! Kylie is an undergraduate majoring in MCDB and Rita is an undergraduate majoring in Biochemistry and Spanish! Welcome!
05/22/2019– Our collaborator Dorota Gryko comes to visit from Poland and gives a seminar! Welcome to Boulder!
05/15/2019– Lab inventory day and happy hour at Brasserie Ten Ten afterwards!
05/10/2019– Mike and Lynn walk at spring commencement! Congratulations!
05/06/2019– Erin joins the lab! Erin is a first-year graduate student in the Biochemistry Ph.D. program! Welcome!
04/28/2019– Amy and Colin travel to Janelia and Amy presents at the Chemical Tools for Complex Biological Systems conference!
04/23/2019– Amy travels to Johns Hopkins to give a seminar!
04/22/2019– Kelsie teaches a case study in CHEM 4720: Metabolic Pathways and Human Disease!
04/19/2019– Lara presents at MMB!
04/15/2019– Abdur’s last day in the lab. Good luck with computer science! We’ll miss you!
04/03/2019– Josh’s paper “Intramolecular Fluorescent Protein Association in a Class of Zinc FRET Sensors Leads to Increased Dynamic Range” is published in the Journal of Physical Chemistry B!
04/01/2019– Leah presents at the Biophysics Supergroup!
03/20/2019– Lab cleanup day and Backcountry Pizza lunch afterwards!
03/18/2019– Evan AND Colin present at the Quantitative Optical Imaging Supergroup!
03/04/2019– Esther presents in the Future of Biophysics Symposium at the Biophysical Society Annual Meeting! Awesome!
02/26/2019– Amy travels to Notre Dame to give a seminar!
01/30/2019– Happy hour for Colin’s Fellowship at Upslope Brewery!
01/26/2019– Kelsie presents an Ignite talk at the GTP Spring Intensive!
01/24/2019– Colin receives a Notice of Award for his F32 Postdoc Fellowship!
12/17/2018– Holiday party and white elephant gift exchange at Amy’s house!
11/26/2018– Kelsie and Lynn are finalists in the CU Up Close Image Competition! Awesome work!
10/21/2018– Kelsie helps organize ComSciCon Rocky Mountain West 2018!
10/09/2018– Erin’s paper “Superiority of SpiroZin2 Versus FluoZin-3 for monitoring vesicular Zn2+ allows tracking of lysosomal Zn2+ pools” is published in Scientific Reports!
10/07/2018– Amy and Josh travel to Janelia and Amy presents at the Fluorescent Proteins and Biological Sensors conference!
09/28/2018– Dave’s last day in the lab! Good luck in Ed Chuong’s lab! Thank you for all your hard work keeping us running, and we’ll miss you.
09/27/2018– Goodbye happy hour for Dave at Sanitas.
09/19/2018– The Palmer lab receives an award from Green Labs for the Annual Freezer Challenge! Thanks, Dave, for spearheading!
09/14/2018– The Palmer lab attends the annual Biochemistry Departmental retreat!
09/07/2018– Erin’s last day in the lab. Good luck at Anschutz! We’ll miss you!
09/06/2018– Esther’s K99 is funded! Congrats!
08/30/2018– Goodbye/celebratory lunch for Erin, Esther, and Colin at Backcountry Pizza!
08/26/2018– Party at Erin’s house to celebrate her thesis!
08/22/2018– Erin (Yu) successfully defends her thesis! Congrats!
08/10/2018– Prem and Sheng’s paper “Directed evolution of excited state lifetime and brightness in FusionRed using a microfluidic sorter” is published in Integrative Biology!
08/01/2018– Colin joins the lab! Colin comes to us from Dr. Jennifer Prescher’s lab at UC Irvine. Welcome!
07/30/2018– Esther’s paper “A multicolor riboswitch-based platform for imaging of RNA in live mammalian cells” is published in Nature Chemical Biology!
07/27/2018– Hannah’s last day in the lab. Good luck in med school! We’ll miss you!
07/23/2018– Goodbye bbq for Hannah and Angela at Amy’s house.
07/19/2018– Kelsie and Lynn win the prizes for top muffin and top cupcake at the Second Annual Great JSCBB Bake Off! Yum!
07/03/2018– Amy travels to Venice to speak at the Helmholtz Pioneer Campus International Conference on Engineering Biomedical Breakthroughs!
06/20/2018– Lynn takes part in the Rocky Mountain Genomics HackCon!
06/05/2018– Angela joins the lab for the summer as part of the SMART Program!
06/03/2018– Mike and Lara travel to Tahoe to attend the FASEB Trace Elements in Biology and Medicine Conference!
05/11/2018– Lab lunch at Le French Café!
05/07/2018– Maria is awarded the SIE Foundation Postdoctoral Fellowship!
04/21/2018– Amy and Kelsie travel to San Diego to attend the ASBMB Annual Meeting!
04/20/2018– Leah successfully passes her oral exam!
04/16/2018– Kelsie teaches a case study in CHEM 4720: Metabolic Pathways and Human Disease!
04/10/2018– Dilara and Esther’s paper “A Multicolor Split-Fluorescent Protein Approach to Visualize Listeria Protein Secretion in Infection” is published in Biophysical Journal!
03/18/2018– Amy travels to Les Houches, France, to teach at the Les Houches Physics School for a week!
02/17/2018– Amy and Esther travel to San Francisco to attend the Biophysical Society Annual Meeting!
12/15/2017– Lab lunch at Backcountry Pizza!
11/30/2017– Lynn receives first place in the CU Up Close Image Competition! Awesome work!
11/17/2017– Van successfully defends her thesis! Congrats!
11/02/2017– Prem successfully defends his thesis! Congrats!
10/25/2017– Amy gives her promotion talk to the Biochemistry department!
08/26/2017– Goodbye (kind of) party for Molly at Amy’s house!
08/25/2017– Dilara’s last day in the lab. You’ll do awesome in the CU biochem grad program! We’ll miss you but see you around!
07/31/2017– Kyle’s last day in the lab. Good luck at Stanford! We’ll miss you!
07/31/2017– Kyle and Molly’s paper “Critical Comparison of FRET-Sensor Functionality in the Cytosol and Endoplasmic Reticulum and Implications for Quantification of Ions” is published in Analytical Chemistry!
07/23/2017– Maria and Kelsie travel to Mount Snow, VT to attend the Cell Biology of Metals Gordon Research Conference!
07/19/2017– Ali’s last day in the lab. Good luck at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center! We’ll miss you!
07/18/2017– Goodbye happy hour for Ali and Kyle.
07/17/2017– Kelsie teaches another CU Science Discovery Course for 11-13 year olds: CSI!
07/14/2017– Kyle successfully defends his thesis! Congrats! Lab party at his house to celebrate!
07/13/2017– Brett successfully defends his thesis! Congrats!
07/10/2017– Lara and Maria take the Dowell Lab’s Short Read Sequence Analysis Workshop! And Lynn is a TA!
07/07/2017– Lab lunch at Backcountry Pizza!
07/05/2017– Evan joins the lab! Evan comes to us from Dr. Gregory Hockerman’s lab at Purdue University. Welcome!
06/17/2017– Amy travels to Taiwan to present at the Biophysical Society’s Single Cell Biophysics Conference!
06/14/2017– Lara, Mike, and Dilara attend the Wind River Conference on Prokaryotic Biology in Estes Park!
06/12/2017– Kelsie teaches a CU Science Discovery Course for 11-13 year olds: CSI!
05/27/2017– Ali’s paper “Optimized Fluorescence Complementation Platform for Visualizing Salmonella Effector Proteins Reveals Distinctly Different Intracellular Niches in Different Cell Types” is published in ACS Infectious Diseases!
05/16/2017– Grant’s last day in the lab. Good luck with pharmacy school! We’ll miss you!
05/15/2017– Abdur joins the lab! Abdur is an undergraduate majoring in Biochemistry and Religious Studies! Welcome!
05/12/2017– Ali, Kyle, and Hannah walk at spring commencement! Congratulations! Ali holds a BBQ in celebration!
05/08/2017– Leah joins the lab! Leah is a first-year graduate student in the Biochemistry Ph.D. program. Welcome!
05/01/2017– Natalie’s last day in the lab. Good luck with senior year! We’ll miss you!
04/13/2017– Lab happy hour to celebrate many exciting things this semester!
04/10/2017– Kelsie successfully passes her oral exam!
04/07/2017– Hannah defends her honors thesis!
04/02/2017– Amy travels to Janelia Research Campus to present at the Frontiers in Imaging Science conference!
03/17/2017– Ali successfully defends her thesis! Congrats! Lab party at Amy’s house to celebrate!
03/17/2017– Lara and Kelsie BOTH receive a NSF Graduate Research Fellowship! Awesome job!
02/11/2017– Amy and Esther travel to New Orleans to attend the Biophysical Society Meeting!
02/02/2017– Lara successfully passes her oral exam!
02/01/2017– Amy gives a talk at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign.
12/15/2016– Lab holiday party! Dave and Joe win the annual cook-off!
11/30/2016– Brett’s paper “Droplet Microfluidic Flow Cytometer For Sorting On Transient Cellular Responses Of Genetically-Encoded Sensors” is published in Analytical Chemistry!
11/17/2016– Dilara, Lynn, and Mike have images selected as finalists in the CU Up Close Image Competition! Awesome work!
11/09/2016– Ali travels to Tampa to the Annual Biomedical Research Conference for Minority Students to recruit for CU!
11/06/2016– Amy travels to Janelia Research Campus to present at the Fluorescent Proteins and Biological Sensors V conference!
11/02/2016– Natalie has her UROP Research Assistantship Grant renewed!
10/20/2016– Amy wins an Addgene Blue Flame Award for plasmids containing pLAMP1-mCherry and calcium sensors!
09/01/2016– Sarah’s last day in the lab. Good luck in the UC Santa Cruz Science Communications Program! We’ll miss you!
08/29/2016– Goodbye happy hour for Sarah.
08/23/2016– Jian Wei Tay, an image analysis specialist, joins the lab! Welcome!
08/22/2016– Another school year starts at CU Boulder! Good luck to everyone taking classes this semester!
08/19/2016– The lab heads to Coors Field for a Rockies Game!
08/12/2016– Yan’s paper “Development of an Optical Zn2+ Probe Based on a Single Fluorescent Protein” is published in ACS Chemical Biology!
07/31/2016– Kelsie attends the Biennial Conference on Chemical Education in Greeley!
07/25/2016– Kelsie teaches another section of the CU Science Discovery Course for 9-11 year olds: Science Detectives!
07/08/2016– Kelsie receives the Biophysics training grant!
07/04/2016– Sarah’s paper “Long-Term Live Cell Imaging Reveals New Roles For Salmonella Effector Proteins SseG and SteA” gets accepted in Cellular Microbiology!
06/27/2016– Kelsie teaches a CU Science Discovery Course for 9-11 year olds: Science Detectives!
06/16/2016– Goodbye party for Liz and Eugenia at Amy’s house.
06/09/2016– Liz’s last day in the lab. Good luck at the Good Food Institute! We will miss you!
06/07/2016– Eugenia’s last day in the lab. We will miss you!
05/31/2016– Van’s first day in the lab! Van is a Biochemistry masters student! Welcome!
05/12/2016– Jordan’s last day in the lab! We’ll miss you!
05/06/2016– Jordan and Dilara walk at CU Spring Commencement! Congratulations!
05/02/2016– Kelsie and Lara join the lab! Kelsie is a first-year graduate student in the Biochemistry Ph.D. program and Lara is a first-year graduate student in the MCDB Ph.D. program! Welcome!
04/28/2016– Sarah travels to Washington DC to participate in ASBMB‘s Hill Day Science Advocacy Event!
04/28/2016– Eugenia and Ali host the MCDB seminar speaker!
04/21/2016– Amy gives a talk at the Chemical Biology program at Indiana University.
04/15/2016– Dilara receives highest honors for her senior thesis work! Congratulations Dilara!
04/08/2016– Fabrizia Stavru visits the lab!
04/04/2016– Dilara defends her honors thesis!
03/13/2016– Amy travels to San Diego to present at the ACS conference!
03/11/2016– The lab participates in the first (annual?) lab trivia night at Amy’s house. Australian Megafauna, a team composed of Lynn, Kelsie, and Lara take first place! Congratulations!
02/14/2016– Amy travels to Hawaii to present at the qBio winter conference!
02/10/2016– Molly travels to Berkeley to present about our zinc sensors at the Advanced Imaging Methods Conference!
01/13/2016– Kevin’s paper is listed as one of the Integrative Biology 2015 Most Downloaded Articles! Congrats!
12/21/2015– Lab holiday party at Eugenia’s house! The group has a cookoff and Eugenia and Maria tie for first place for best dish! Honorable mentions go to Liz and Dave! Nice work everyone! The food was delicious!
12/20/2015– Lab outing! The lab goes cross country skiing/snowshoeing at Brainard Lake!
12/15/2015– Amy gives a talk at Pacifichem 2015 in Honolulu, Hawaii!
12/01/2015– Sarah and Lynn host the BioFrontiers Seminar speaker.
11/19/2015– Amy gives at talk at Caltech.
11/09/2015– Amy gives a talk at Washington University at Saint Louis!
11/05/2015– Wine and cheese party at Amy’s house!
11/01/2015– Natalie receives a UROP Research Assistantship Grant!
10/30/2015– Jordan’s UROP Individual Grant gets renewed!
10/24/2015– Sarah and Eugenia present their research at the Portal to the Public “Meet a Scientist” event and Sarah is quoted in a newspaper article discussing the event!
10/15/2015– Maria joins the lab! Maria received her Ph.D. from Dartmouth with Dr. Mary Lou Guerinot! Welcome!
10/11/2015– Ali and Esther travel to Heidelberg, Germany to attend the EMBO New Approaches and Concepts in Microbiology conference.
10/05/2015– Amy travels to Heidelberg, Germany to attend the EMBO Seeing is Believing conference.
10/02/2015– Kyle returns from Boston! Welcome back!
09/28/2015– Amy gives a talk at NYU!
09/09/2015– Amy gives at talk at Georgia Tech.
08/27/2015– The lab goes out to lunch to celebrate with Yan as she heads to the University of Denver to start her own lab! Congratulations, Yan!
08/24/2015– Lynn is accepted into the IQ Biology doctoral certificate program!
08/14/2015– Yeabsira’s last day in the lab!
08/11/2015– Yeabsira gives a talk about summer research at the BURST summer presentation session.
08/06/2015– Mateo presents his summer research at the annual SMART Summer Poster Symposium!
07/27/2015– Sarah and Liz coteach a 1 week Biotechnology course for high school students as part of the CU Science Discovery program.
07/26/2015– Amy, Eugenia, Lynn, and Molly travel to West Dover, VT to present their research at the Cell Biology of Metals Gordon Research Conference!
07/24/2015– Mateo travels to Connecticut to present his summer research at the Leadership Alliance National Symposium.
07/23/2015– The Palmer lab high school students from the Summer Discovery program present their research at a poster session!
07/20/2015– Liz travels to Berkeley, CA to attend the CRISPR Workshop at the Innovative Genomics Initiative (UC Berkeley)!
07/05/2015– Kyle travels to Boston, MA to start a three month internship at a biotech company!
06/29/2015– Sarah and Liz coteach a 3 week Biotechnology course for high school students as part of the Summer Discovery program.
06/29/2015– Four high school students from the Summer Discovery program start their month long research projects in the Palmer lab. They will be working in pairs – one pair with Lynn and Yu and the other pair with Esther and Ali. Welcome!
06/19/2015– Amy heads to Paris to meet with collaborators!
06/10/2015– Lab BBQ at Amy’s house! It’s amazing how much our lab has grown in the last year!
06/01/2015– Mateo returns for another summer in the Palmer lab!
05/18/2015– Natalie and Dilara join the lab! Welcome!
05/13/2015– Zack’s last day in the lab. Good luck starting graduate school this fall at Cornell!
05/11/2015– Madi’s last day in the lab. Good luck with Teach for America!
05/08/2015– Sarah, Madi, and Zack walk at CU Spring Commencement! Congratulations!
04/28/2015– Yan travels to the Marine Biological Laboratory in Woods Hole, MA to attend the Analytical and Quantitative Light Microscopy course!
04/07/2015– Sarah travels to Cold Spring Harbor to attend the Quantitative Imaging: From Cells to Molecules course!
04/01/2015– Dave’s first day as our new Lab Manager! Welcome!
03/27/2015– Sarah and Mateo travel to Boston to attend the Experimental Biology 2015 Conference!
03/24/2015– The lab attends the first ever Andor Academy at BioFrontiers!
03/24/2015– Amy travels to Germany to attend the 66th Mosbacher Kolloquium (Metals in Biology – Cellular Functions and Diseases)
03/20/2015– Yeabsira receives a BURST grant to continue her research over the summer!
03/13/2015– Liz, Lynn, Yu, and Yan attend the Optogenetics Keystone Meeting in Denver and Yan presents her research.
02/02/2015– Eugenia joins the lab! Eugenia comes to us from Corrie Detweiler’s lab in MCDB! Welcome!
01/14/2015– Yeabsira’s first day in the lab!
01/05/2015– Molly joins the lab! Molly received her Ph.D. from Dartmouth with Dr. Dean Wilcox. Welcome!
01/05/2015– Sarah’s first day as a postdoc!
01/05/2015– Esther travels to Paris to meet with collaborators at the Institut Pasteur!
12/15/2014– Amy presents at the NIH Common Fund High-Risk High-Rewards Symposium at NIH!
12/10/2014– The group has a cookoff at the annual holiday party! For best main couse – Sarah comes in first and Ali comes in second! For best dessert – Lynn comes in first and Joe comes in second! Nice work all… it was delicious!
11/17/2014– Schuyler presents on his postdoctoral research at our lab meeting!
10/24/2014– Sarah successfully defends her thesis!
10/11/2014– The Palmer lab attends the annual Biochemistry Departmental retreat and Kyle gives a great talk!
10/10/2014– Kyle and Mike present their research at the Pharmaceutical Biotechnology retreat.
10/06/2014– Liz joins the lab! Liz received her Ph.D. from UCSD with Dr. Steve Mayfield. Welcome!
09/28/2014– Amy attends the Fluorescent Proteins and Biological Sensors IV conference at Janelia Farms.
09/14/2014– Amy and Lynn attend the International Society for Zinc Biology conference in Monterey, CA!
09/12/2014– Amy receives a Director’s Pioneer Award from the National Institutes of Health!
08/11/2014– Joe Dragavon arrives to run our Biofrontiers Microscopy Core! Welcome!
08/07/2014– Mateo presents his summer research at the annual SMART Summer Poster Symposium!
07/25/2014– Mateo travels to Connecticut to present his summer research at the Leadership Alliance National Symposium.
07/25/2014– Yan receives her K99 fellowship from the NIH!
07/23/2014– Dr. Caryn Outten from the University of South Carolina arrives to carry out her sabbatical in our lab. Welcome!
07/22/2014– Mike receives the Pharmaceutical Biotechnology Training Grant!
07/06/2014– Amy attends the Human Frontier Science Program’s Awardees Meeting in Lugano, Switzerland!
06/25/2014– Lynn receives the Signaling and Cellular Regulation Training Grant!
06/23/2014– Yan’s K99 fellowship from the NIH is pending!
06/02/2014 – Mateo, our summer research (SMART) undergraduate intern, starts working in the lab on a pathogenesis project!
06/01/2014 – Amy, Yan, Kyle, Yu, and Lynn present their research at the Trace Elements in Biology and Medicine Conference!
05/30/2014 – Genevieve’s last day in the lab. Now she is headed back to medical school to finish her MD! Congratulations and good luck!
05/12/2014– Mike and Lynn join the lab!
05/12/2014– Sarah presents her research at the annual Signaling Minisymposium.
05/02/2014– Eldon’s last day in the lab! Good luck at GE Healthsciences!
04/28/2014 – Madi presents her work at the UROP/HHMI poster session.
04/22/2014 – Kevin’s last day as our microscopy core director! We wish him the best of luck as he starts his postdoctoral research position at UT Southwestern!
04/14/2014 – Esther joins the lab! Esther received her PhD from Notre Dame with Dr. Patricia Clark. Exciting!
04/04/2014 – Genevieve successfully defends her thesis!
04/01/2014 – Amy and Corrie Detweiler are awarded a Butcher seed grant for collaboration on the Salmonella project!
11/01/2013 – Madi is awarded a UROP HHMI Biosciences grant!
10/13/2013 – Sarah travels to Heidelberg, Germany to present her work at the EMBO New Approaches and Concepts in Microbiology conference.
10/05/2013 – Sarah, Ali, and Amy travel to Boston, MA to present their work at the ASM Salmonella conference.
10/03/2013 – Kevin travels to Heidelberg, Germany to present his work at the EMBO Seeing is Believing conference.
09/25/2013 – The group has a cook off! Ali is awarded first place! Eldon and Yan come in second and third.
09/15/2013 – Genevieve returns from France!
09/05/2013 – Yan publishes her work comparing Zinc (II) quantification between FRET sensors and a small molecule dye in ACS Chemical Biology!
07/28/2013 – Amy, Kyle, and Yan travel to Newport, RI to present their work at the Cell Biology of Metals Gordon conference.
07/12/2013 – Jose’s last day in the lab! Now he’s off to do a postdoc at the University of Colorado Health Sciences Center! Good luck, Jose!
06/18/2013 – Genevieve heads to Paris to work on a three month project at the Institut Pasteur with Jost Enninga!
05/29/2013 – Sarah is awarded an F31 fellowship from the NIH!
05/14/2013 – Sarah travels to Paris to take a course on using the image analysis software Icy with Amy at the Institut Pasteur!
05/06/2013 – Yu joins the Palmer lab!
05/01/2013 – Amy and Natalie Ahn are awarded a Butcher Seed Grant for collaboration in the Zinc project!
02/12/2013 – Palmer Lab Website is back!!!
12/31/2012 – Amy takes off for Paris to carry out her sabbatical at the Institut Pasteur with Pascale Cossart!
12/18/2012 – In collaboration with David J. Eide, at the University of Wisconsin, a paper is published in PNAS regarding vesicular zinc efflux.
11/16/2012 – Jose publishes his work on alternately colored FRET sensors in PLoS One!
08/20/2012 – The lab goes out to happy hour to celebrate with Hairong as she takes off to Drexel University to start her own lab!
08/09/2012 – Jamal Bryant concludes his excellent summer research at the SMART poster conference!
09/01/2012 – Madi receives a UROP grant!
06/12/2012 – Genevieve published in ACS Chemical Biology!
06/12/2012– Amy gave a talk at the FASEB meeting “Trace Elements in Biology & Medicine” in Steamboat Springs, CO.
05/23/2012 – The new Jennie Smoly Biotechnology Building Microscopy Core is up and running, with a brand new 6 laser line, 4 PMT, resonant scanning confocal with additional functionality provided by single molecule total internal reflection fluorescence (TIRF)!
05/14/2012– Jose will be giving a talk at the Signaling Symposium at University of Colorado!
05/01/2012 – Madi receives a UROP grant!
05/01/2012– A review, Visualizing Metal Ions in Cells: An Overview of Analytical Techniques, Approaches, and Probes is published in Biochim. Biophys. Acta!
03/17/2012- Jennifer’s paper on Red-Fluorescent Protein Photobleaching Cytometry published by ACS Analytical Chemistry!
02/17/2012 – Genevieve was awarded 2nd place in poster competition at the ISZB meeting in Australia!
02/09/2012 – Hairong Ma’s microfluidic work featured in Biotechniques!
01/22/2012 – Hairong Ma published in JACS this week on her microfluidic work! High-Throughput Examination of FRET-detected Metal-Ion Response in Mammalian Cells.
01/10/2012 – Amy and her family, as well as Genevieve Park, travel to present their work in Australia at the International Society for Zinc Biology Melbourne Conference.
10/05/2011 – After 6 years of work, Amy gave her tenure talk to a full audience in Cristol 142!
09/12/2011 – Sarah at Cold Spring Harbor presenting her recent work on Salmonella at the Microbial Pathogenesis Meeting
09/09/2011 – The Palmer lab attended the University of Colorado Biochemistry retreat in Winter Park, and Ali gave a great talk!
08/19/2011 – Janet’s last day in lab, we wish her all the best as she takes off to start her exciting post-doc at UT-Southwestern!
08/5/2011 – Microscope upgraded, and now includes perfect focus system and automated stage, enabling multipoint time-lapse imaging without drift!
08/29/2011 – Hairong and Jennifer presented their recent work at the ACS conference in Denver.
7/03/2011 – Caitlin Stoddard had her last day in the Palmer lab and is headed to UC San Francisco to start her own graduate career! Congrats!
7/1/2011 – Analysis of Red-Fluorescent Proteins Provides Insights into Dark-State Conversion and Photodegradation accepted by Biophysical Journal!
6/10/2011 – The lab headed up into the mountains, through the small town of Fairplay (The home of Comedy Central’s South Park) to Buena Vista, and went white water rafting in Brown Canyon! A couple photos provided in the lab photos section.
5/20/2011 – Amy visited her undergraduate Alma Matter, Dartmouth, to give an invited talk.
5/9/2011 – Genevieve visits HHMI’s Janelia Farm for a conference on mitochondria!
5/3/2011 – Amy gave a talk at University of Wisconsin, Madison.
5/1/2011 – Ali joined the Palmer Lab and will work on the Salmonella project!
4/3/2011 – Kevin attended HHMI’s Janlia Farm for a conference on multiphoton imaging, visited with Schuyler (now at the NIH), and even got a personal tour to see Harold Hess’ iPalm.
3/24/2011 – Zach was awarded the Bioscience Undergraduate Research Skills & Training (BURST) fellowship from the Biological Sciences Initiative (BSI)!
3/21/2011 – Yan’s paper, ‘Measuring Steady State and Dynamic ER and Golgi Zn(II) with Genetically Encoded Sensors’ published by PNAS!
3/10/2011 – Janet turns 30!
3/7/2011 – Jennifer Lubbeck, part of the RFP collaboration, gives a talk at Biophysical Society.
3/3/2011 – Amy, Yan, Genevieve, and Janet publish a review on biosensors in Trends Biotechnology.
1/10/2011 – Amy featured in the National Institute of General Medical Science’s ‘Findings’.
12/17/2010 – Janet graduates with her PhD!
12/15/2010 – Jennette, a first year organic graduate student with previous experience involving bioinorganic chemistry, joined the lab. She will be focusing on Zinc (II) homeostasis and disease.
10/30/2010 – Janet and Amy are published in Nature – In collaboration with Vamsi Mootha at Harvard Medical School, Janet and Amy confirmed the involvement of MICU1, a mitochondrial associated protein with Calcium (II) uptake. For decades, the mechanism of mitochondrial calcim uptake has remained enigmatic, and this paper provides a significant step forward in understanding mitochondrial calcium homeostasis and dynamics in vivo.
10/25/2010 – Genevieve and Sarah join the lab – Genevieve Park, an MD/PH.D. student attending the University of Colorado Health Sciences Center and Sarah McQuate, a 3rd year graduate student in the department of Chemistry & Biochemistry, recently joined the lab. Sarah received her B.S. from the University of Puget Sound in the Pacific Northwest and will study Salmonella pathogensis. Genevieve received her B.S. from Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and will study Zinc (II) homeostasis.
9/8/2010 – Kevin presented a poster at the Society of General Physiologists ‘New Optical Methods in Cell Physiology’ Symposia at Wood’s Hole, MA.
7/10/2010 – Amy’s first graduate student, Phil Dittmer, successfully defended his Ph.D. The topic of his dissertation was the sub-cellular localization and dynamics of zinc (II) in biological health and signaling.
6/12/2010 – Yan and Jose Attend FASEB Trace Metals – Yan will present her recent work regarding the development of improved fluorescent protein based Zinc (II) sensors that can now measure metal homeostasis from picomolar to micromolar quantities. In addition, Jose was awarded a FASEB MARC travel award to attend the conference.
4/4/2010 – Microfluidic Cell Counter published – Dawn Schaefer (Colorado School of Mines) and Emily Gibson report a simple fabrication technique to create all silicon/glass microfluidic devices using femtosecond laser ablation and anodic bonding. In a first application, they constructed a cell counting device based on small angle light scattering. The counter featured embedded optical fibers for multi-angle excitation and detection of scattered light and/or fluorescence. The performance of the microfluidic counter was benchmarked against a commercial fluorescence-activated cell sorter.
4/1/2010 – Sub-Cellular Zinc (II) Dynamics published – In this publication, several new genetically encoded sensors for Zinc (II) are presented based upon fluorescence resonance energy transfer (FRET). Sources and sinks for Zinc (II) are explored within the cell, including the cytosol, plasma membrane, and mitochondria. Localized probes reveal that mitochondria contain an elevated pool of Zinc (II) under resting conditions that can be released into the cytosol upon glutamate stimulation of hippocampal neurons. Results suggests that mitochondria serve as a source of and a sink for Zinc (II) signals under different cellular conditions.
4/1/2010 – FACS-Based Selection of 3x ReAsH Motif published – Schuyler performed an in situ selection of a randomized amino acid linker library (10.2 million peptides) flanking three tandem optimized TC repeats.
4/1/2010 – Calcium Dynamics, Alzheimers, and Presenillin-1 published – The connection between presenillin-1, calcium regulation, and Alzheimer’s disease may provide the key to understanding the long-observed, but poorly understood, link between Alzheimer’s disease and Calcium (II) dysregulation. In this study, Janet examined seven familial Alzheimer’s causing mutations in presenillin-1 to define how they influence ER calcium levels and dynamics. Ultimately, results indicate that mutations in presenillin-1 can alter the balance of calcium in cells and have the potential to influence the nature of calcium signals.
4/1/2010 – Real-Time Salmonella Invasion – Featured int he news and views section of Nature Structural and Molecular Biology, Published in Nature Methods, Schuyler uses a GFP complementation assay to tag effectors of the type-III secretion system in gram-negative bacteria, thereby allowing real-time localization and imaging of the effectors in the host cell throughout the course of a bacterial infection.
4/1/2010 – Schuyler Defends – Schuyler successfully defended his Ph.D. and has accepted a position as a post-doctoral associate with Dr. Jennifer Lippincott-Schwartz at the NIH in Maryland.
3/5/2010 – Kevin presents at Janelia Farm – Presenting at Janelia Farm’s ‘Novel Approaches to Bioimaging II’ Conference, Kevin was asked to give a short talk regarding his recent work involving microfluidic based optimization of red-fluorescent proteins.