John Kuwada

Professor Kuwada retired on December 31, 2020.

The Kuwada lab used a multi-organism approach to investigate genes that are essential for the function of neural circuits in the brain that regulate behavior and how these genes cause human diseases when they are defective. Zebrafish and Drosophila are studied since they are experimentally accessible at all stages of development allowing for analysis in living embryos with electrophysiology and sophisticated imaging based strategies to discern signaling within neural circuits. Importantly zebrafish and Drosophila genes can be studied with powerful methods for the generation of mutant and transgenic animals. Projects included the analysis of several novel genes that regulate voltage-dependent Ca2+ channels in muscles and neurons and thus their excitability. How these genes regulate channels is being analyzed by genetic strategies for manipulating the activity of specific neurons. We found that one of these genes is responsible for a human muscle disease and by inserting the mutant human gene into zebrafish, we discovered how the mutated gene leads to the congenital disease. More recent studies of these genes in zebrafish and Drosophila suggest that they regulate critical signaling at synapses, which are responsible for communication between neurons and neural circuit function.

Dr. Kuwada received his Ph.D. from Stanford University in 1980 where he was an NSF predoctoral fellow and was an NSF and NIH postdoctoral fellow at the University of California, San Diego. In 1994 he was a Visiting Professor at Basel University and in 1999 a Visiting Scientist at the RIKEN Institute in Tokyo, Japan.

Field(s) of Study

• Molecular Genetics of Nervous System Development and Function.

Areas of Focus

• Development
• Neurobiology & Animal Physiology