BME Lecture: Bo Huang, UC San Francisco

Abstract: Optical microscopy offers the opportunity to see clear pictures of cellular and subcellular structures and dynamics. With our multicolor, three-dimensional imaging schemes and coordinate-based image analysis approaches, we have used super-resolution microscopy to the dissection or molecular organization of the centrosome and cilium transition zone. In order to facilitate live cell microscopy, we are also developing “open-top” light-sheet microscopes that offer the compatibility with everyday biological sample format. In combination with our recent developments of fluorescent labeling methods for DNA and endogenous proteins in living cells, these microscopy techniques will bring in new insights into how cellular processes are carried out by coordinated participation of biomolecules in a tiny volume.

Bio: Bo Huang received a bachelor of science degree in chemistry in 2001 from Peking University, China, and a doctorate in chemistry in 2006 from Stanford University. He completed his postdoctoral work at Harvard University's Department of Chemistry and Chemical Biology before starting as an assistant professor in 2009 in the Department of Pharmaceutical Chemistry, UC San Francisco, with a joint appointment in the Department of Biochemistry and Biophysics. He was promoted to associate professor in 2014. Huang has pioneered the development of super-resolution microscopy techniques, their applications in elucidating the architecture of molecular complexes, and the development of other microscopy and labeling methods for the visualization of DNA and endogenous proteins in living cells. He has won prizes including the Searle Scholarship, Packard Fellowship for Science and Engineering, NIH Director’s New Innovator Award, and the American Society for Cell Biology Early Career Life Scientist Award.