The Whitney Laboratory for Marine Bioscience
Former postdoc with Dr. Mark Q. Martindale at Whitney Laboratory Dr. Michael Layden recently received tenure and promotion to Associate Professor at Lehigh University. Dr. Layden is interested in the evolution of the nervous system and is using transgenic sea anemones and functional genomics to understand the molecular basis of the development and regeneration of functional nervous systems in real time.
In addition, former Martindale lab grad student and postdoc, Dr. Dave Q Matus, just received the same honor of tenure and promotion at Stonybrook University in New York. Dr. Matus has worked on a number of interesting problems including the evolution of developmental patterning mechanisms to understanding the cellular basis of cancer cell metastasis using the model nematode Caenorhabditis elegans. Dr. Matus has worked with Nobel Prize winners to utilize cutting edge optical microscopy (e.g. two photon, super resolution, and light sheet) to watch complex cellular behaviors in real time.
Congratulations to both Dave and Mike! All your hard work has paid off and we look forward to watching your future careers grow. Despite the COVID-19 pandemic, at least some good things are happening in 2020!
Photo sources: Dr. Layden Dr. Matus