The Many Phases Of A Cell

Living cells routinely orchestrate millions of interactions, reactions, and transport amongst biomolecules in crowded, heterogeneous environments to run the functions of life. These molecules are not well-mixed inside a cell. Rather, they self-organize into dozens of coexisting membraneless compartments called biomolecular condensates. In this talk, I describe an emerging paradigm that describes how condensates form and function through phase transitions. I will touch upon the broader themes of self-organization and molecular ensembles through specific examples drawn from our lab's research and share my career path.

Krishna Shrinivas is an Assistant Professor of ChBE at Northwestern where he leads an interdisciplinary lab that develops models to understand and engineer life. He was previously a fellow at Harvard, and before that, completed his PhD in ChemE at MIT. Although trained entirely in ChemE, his interests, research, and career has taken him through various pitstops that span chemistry, biology, physics, and math.