In today’s episode, we have the pleasure of chatting with Dr. Colm Kelleher, a physicist in the Bioinspired Institute at Syracuse University. 

During cell division, the chromosomes that contain the genetic material must be copied and segregated. Failure to segregate correctly has dire consequences for cell viability and is a common problem during IVF and pre-implantation embryo culture. 

The spindle apparatus that segregates the chromosomes is comprised of ~1000 distinct types of proteins with many thousands of copies of each type. With that in mind, we can imagine the spindle as an extremely complicated molecular machine with millions of parts that each need to be in the right place at the right time for the spindle to carry out its essential functions. This kind of description raises some serious questions. 

For example, how can we know which parts are the most consequential when there are so many, and the relative importance of different parts changes over time or depends on the molecular details of the cellular environment? 

Dr. Kelleher argues that there is another way to think about it. He is working to apply intermediate scale models from materials physics to describe spindle formation in a way that minimizes that number of things that need to be measured in the lab. In other words, how should we describe spindle formation, if we can’t rely on knowing everything about the molecules that make it up? As it turns out, the spindle apparatus has more in common with a handful of dried spaghetti than you might think. 

Check out our website: https://ssr.org/

Link to Dr. Kelleher's faculty page: https://artsandsciences.syracuse.edu/people/faculty/colm-kelleher/#Biography