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| Name |
Waterman, Clare M. |
| Location
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National Institutes of Health |
| Primary Field
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Cellular and Developmental Biology |
| Secondary Field
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Biophysics and Computational Biology |
 Election Citation
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Waterman made seminal contributions to understanding cell migration in development and disease. She pioneered the direct determination of protein organization and motion in living cells, which she utilized to define the nanometer-scale architecture and dynamics of the molecular assemblies that generate, organize, and transmit forces that drive cell movement. |
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Research Interests
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Clare Waterman's research program is focused on understanding how proteins self-organize into cell-scale macromolecular ensembles that mediate the dynamic morphological and physical processes driving cell migration. The ability of cells to directionally move is critical to embryogenesis, development of the vascular and nervous systems, immune response and wound healing, and its regulation is compromised in vascular disease, immune disease and cancer. Waterman invented the method of Fluorescent Speckle Microscopy (FSM) and used this and other state-of-the art light microscopy methods to elucidate how macromolecular protein complexes self-organize at the cell-scale to mediate directed physical outputs that drive specific cell shape change and movement. She has pioneered an integrated approach that demonstrated how cellular structures composed of the microtubule, filamentous actin, and integrin adhesion proteins are dynamically built and maintained, how they physically interact with one another, and how cell signaling coordinates their structure and dynamics to specifically mediate cell migration. Her work has shown that specific transient protein-protein interactions in a ?molecular clutch? generate organized and directed forces in the cytoskeleton and transmit them through integrin-based focal adhesions to the extracellular environment to drive cell motility and morphogenesis of the vasculature.
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