The primary focus of our work is to develop a fundamental understanding of the mechanisms that govern the formation of multinucleated cell types produced by cell-cell fusion \u2013 making one from many. The dysfunction of these \u201csyncytial\u201d cells leads to metabolic disease, age related frailties, pediatric disorders, pregnancy loss, and dystrophic pathology depending on the cell type misbehaving. Our primary focus lies in resolving how multinucleated osteoclasts form, function, and coordinate with neighboring cell types to manage the life-long maintenance and repair of the skeletal system. Bones are living tissues, continuously remade on-site by teams of multinucleated osteoclasts that resorb old bone and osteoblasts that deposit new bone. The number of nuclei within a multinucleated osteoclast determines its resorption capacity, and many skeletal pathologies (e.g., fibrous dysplasia, osteopetrosis, osteoporosis, metastatic bone disease) are underpinned by perturbations in the number\/size of osteoclasts, resulting in skeletal dysfunction in >200 million individuals. We utilize in vitro, ex vivo, and in vivo models and employ tools from molecular and cell biology, biochemistry, membrane biophysics to answer fundamental gaps in our understanding of how osteoclasts form, function, and signal to manage the biomechanical integrity of the skeleton. Moreover, we work with our clinical and pharmaceutical partners to translate our findings towards the development of the next generation of targeted treatment strategies for addressing pediatric skeletal pathologies impacting our neighbors and their families.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":1734874,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"otheraff":[],"phd-degree":[2571,2572],"primary":[2335],"research-discipline":[2487,2493,2498,2490,2509],"research-opportunity":[2540,2546,2549],"training-grant":[],"class_list":["post-1731197","faculty-listing","type-faculty-listing","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","phd-degree-phd-biophysics","phd-degree-phd-physiology","primary-molecular-physiology-and-biological-physics","research-discipline-biochemistry","research-discipline-biophysics","research-discipline-cell-and-developmental-biology","research-discipline-molecular-biology","research-discipline-physiology","research-opportunity-ro-biochemistry","research-opportunity-ro-biophysicsandstructuralbiology","research-opportunity-ro-cellbiology"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n