Cell signaling under external stimulation is a critical mechanism that governs many biological processes such as cell proliferation, cell migration, and cell apoptosis, etc. For multicellular organisms, the ability to synchronize heterogeneous individual cellular responses through intercellular communication is crucial to maintain normal functionality. However, even though the biological pathways...
Ultrafast spectroscopy has recently gained momentum as a powerful, noninvasive characterization toolset capable of studying a diverse array of samples with applications in chemistry, physics, biology, engineering, and more. Two popular ultrafast spectroscopic techniques include femtosecond transient absorption (fs-TA) and femtosecond stimulated Raman spectroscopy (FSRS). The latter of these techniques...
In this dissertation, I present experimental observations of multiply charged atomic ions (MCAI) generated from interactions of atomic/molecular clusters with moderately intense nanosecond laser pulses. This process is also known as Coulomb explosion (CE) and it has been extensively studied in intense laser fields using ultrashort pulses. Several prevailing theories...
Wheat sharp eyespot (SES), caused by the soil-borne fungus Rhizoctonia cerealis is a common stem disease of wheat globally. The disease caused a severe and extensive epidemic throughout the Willamette Valley of Oregon in 2014 and has remained one of the most important wheat diseases in this region. However, litte...
In this dissertation, I describe the experimental investigation of electron diffraction of neutral and ionic clusters doped into superfluid helium droplets. The project is aimed at contributing to the development of an overall approach called ‘serial single molecule electron diffraction imaging (ss-EDI), a potential approach to solve macromolecule structures bypassing...
The Hippo signaling pathway is an evolutionarily conserved regulator of cell growth, proliferation, and apoptosis. A key function of the pathway is to regulate the subcellular distribution and activity of Yorkie in Drosophila or Yes-associated protein (YAP) and transcription co-activator with PDZ-binding motif (TAZ) in mammals. The dysregulation of the...
The microbial communities play a crucial role in maintaining human health and cause diseases through very complex microbial chemical interactions. Therefore, these microbial communities have drawn much attention to the scientific communities. To elucidate these complex microbial communities and the chemical interactions within it, one or more isolated species of...
In the past decades, femtosecond stimulated Raman spectroscopy (FSRS) has been gaining tremendous popularity in fundamental sciences stemming from chemistry to biology. It is capable of capturing both equilibrium and non-equilibrium structural information across a broad range of timescales with simultaneously high temporal and spectral resolutions. Femtosecond transient absorption spectroscopy...
Cell migration is fundamental for physiological processes such as immune re-sponses, wound healing and development. It is also a critical characteristic of metastatic cancer cells. An extensive amount of studies have focused on 2D sub-strates in order to understand the mechanism of cancer metastasis. However, much less is known about...
Dental plaque is one of the well-characterized biofilms in the human body. Oral bacterial species play vital roles in maintaining healthy bacterial homeostasis as well as causing oral infections. Many of the oral diseases are caused by opportunistic pathogens, and therefore, the bacterial metabolic activities become important in dictating their...