Padmini Rangamani

Professor Rangamani's research is focused on understanding the design principles of biological systems.
Her long-term research goal is to understand the control of cell shape by analyzing biological membranes and their interaction with proteins and the cytoskeleton using principles from transport phenomena. This is a unifying framework that brings together, the mechanics of the membrane, membrane-bound proteins, and their coupled interactions. Her work uses a combination of novel mechanical theories and computational approaches to simulate many aspects of cellular membranes, in collaboration with experimentalists.  Areas of current focus are:

• Transport phenomena in biological membranes: How do lipid flow, lipid diffusion, and protein diffusion interact with bulk cytoplasmic fluid and proteins in solution to regulate cell shape?
• Influence of cell shape on biochemical activation of signaling networks: How does a given cell shape affect the activation of signaling networks and transcription factor activation?
• Morphological and topological changes to lipid membranes mediated by proteins and cytoskeletal forces: How do membrane proteins and cytoskeletal elements interact with the plasma membrane to generate morphological changes (e.g. endocytosis) or topological changes (e.g. vesicle fusion)?