“Leveraging Drosophila Circadian Biology Reveals a Neurodegeneration-Aging-Cancer Connection”
Michael Rosbash, PhD
2017 Nobel Prize laureate in Physiology or Medicine
Peter Gruber Endowed Chair in Neuroscience
Professor of Biology
Investigator, Howard Hughes Medical Institute
Brandeis University
Rosbash is interested in the RNA processing, genes and mechanisms that underlie circadian rhythms — the 24-hour pacemaker that is nearly ubiquitous among higher organisms. Using Drosophila as a model system, Rosbash and his team study the mechanisms and importance of neuronal circuitry and plasticity to circadian rhythms, as well as the contributions of transcriptional and posttranscriptional regulation. They also study how circadian clocks function within the brain to influence sleep and the enigmatic process of temperature compensation.
Rosbash was awarded the 2017 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine along with Jeffrey Hall and Michael Young “for their discoveries of molecular mechanisms controlling the circadian rhythm.”