Matthew Zupan

I am a graduate student in the Meredith Hartley lab in the Chemistry Department. Our lab studies lipids in the central nervous system and their involvement in myelin formation. Myelin is a fatty substance that insulates axons and increases the efficiency of neural signaling. Myelination arises from mature oligodendrocytes, glial cells that form extensions that can develop into myelin sheaths. However, in multiple sclerosis, oligodendrocyte progenitor cells in adults do not always differentiate into mature oligodendrocytes, leading to regions of demyelinating lesions. Therefore, it is important to research central nervous system physiology and pathophysiology to have a better understanding of the lipid regulatory pathways that are at play during the myelination process. Lysophosphatidic acid (LPA), a lipid formed from lysophosphatidylcholine (LPC) by the enzyme autotaxin (ATX), is in part responsible for the formation of mature oligodendrocytes. It functions by binding to a membrane receptor protein on the surface of oligodendrocytes, but little is known about the specifics of the signaling pathway and how it affects the development of oligodendrocyte progenitor cells into mature oligodendrocytes. My research involves determining the specific roles that LPA and ATX play in the maturation of oligodendrocytes and also developing a chemical biology tool to directly look at ATX activity in cells.