Joseph Falke
University of Colorado Boulder, CO·Biochemistry
Macrophages are immune cells that hunt down infections and damaged tissue, then swallow and destroy them. Two cellular programs make this possible.
- Fields
Biochemistry
Biophysics
Microbiology & Immunology
- Topics
phosphoinositide 3-kinase
lipid kinases
lipid signaling
- Grants
- 1 known grant, through Dec 2026
What they work on
- Determine how Class 1 and Class 3 PI3K enzymes integrate calcium, receptor and G protein inputs, and whether these combine additively, synergistically or in opposition, using single-molecule TIRF microscopy on supported lipid bilayers.
- Define how the output lipids PIP3 and PI3P activate downstream master protein kinases in reconstituted membrane signaling modules.
- Uncover how drugs, potential therapeutics and disease-linked mutations inhibit or overactivate PI3K pathway components and reaction steps.
- Test predictions of in vitro mechanistic models in living macrophages, using fluorescent sensors and live-cell imaging of chemotaxis and phagocytosis.
More about the research
Chemotaxis steers the cell toward a chemical signal. Phagocytosis engulfs the target in a membrane pouch called a phagosome. Both programs are controlled by PI3K enzymes, lipid kinases that add phosphate groups to membrane fats to create signals. When PI3K pathways go wrong, they can drive cancer, developmental disorders, inflammation, autoimmunity and immune defects.
Why it matters
PI3K lipid signaling is central to innate immunity, and its dysregulation contributes to cancer, inflammation, autoimmunity and developmental disorders. Understanding how normal regulation works, how disease mutations disrupt it, and how drugs act could inform therapies that correct faulty PI3K signaling.
Known grants
From NIH and NSF research grants. Labs often have other funding we can't see.
Closest labs
Moitrayee Bhattacharyya
Yale University, CT·Biochemistry
Develop a pipeline using styrene-maleic acid copolymers to extract membrane proteins as ~10–15 nm "native nanodiscs" that keep their surrounding native lipids and partner proteins, followed by enrichment and purification.
Nathan Wittenberg
Lehigh University, PA·Biophysics·Early-career
Determine how vesicle size, surface charge, lipid saturation and lipopolysaccharide composition control binding of the antimicrobial peptide LL-37, using liposomes of defined composition measured on single vesicles and subpopulations.
Comert Kural
Ohio State University, OH·Biophysics
Build and iteratively optimize a 3D TIRF-SIM microscope, combining surface-limited illumination, patterned-light super-resolution and evanescent field nanometry, for the best spatial and temporal resolution.
The school
University of Colorado Boulder: 36 labs on PI Pages, $718M a year on research, 447 research doctorates a year.
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