Welcome, Hui (William) Wang to Idaho, the University of Idaho and to the Institute for Modeling Collaboration and Innovation!
Geospatial Modeling is a current Core Initiative, or unique research area for ICMI. We are excited to add a talented postdoctoral fellow to the team with this focus and look forward to establishing new collaborations.
William has been in the US for five years and just finished his PhD in Geography at the University of Connecticut. He made the drive to Moscow by himself, crossing 12 states and enjoying the diverse landscape along the way.
So far he’s discovered Moscow’s Farmer’s Market and many friendly people. Soccer is William’s sport of choice and he also enjoys fishing and hiking. He’s excited about the move. “Idaho is the right state for me!” he stated.
The Office of Research and Faculty Development offers a weekly seminar that guides faculty through the proposal development process of competitive external grants. All faculty are invited and welcome to attend in person or via Zoom.
I am pleased to announce that the Institute for Modeling Collaboration and Innovation (IMCI) has been granted Tier III status at the University of Idaho effective September 1. IMCI builds on the success of the Center for Modeling Complex Interactions (CMCI), originally funded by a Center of Biomedical Research Excellence (COBRE) grant from the National Institutes of Health. Level III allows us to expand our modeling efforts beyond our original biomedical mission.
Our personnel and budgetary management now resided in the Office of Research and Economic Development. IMCI continue to focus on interdisciplinary, collaborative research with modeling as a unifying feature. As you know, modeling improves research at every stage: making predictions, generating hypotheses, exploring scenarios, and guiding empirical work.
CMCI DOESN’T GO AWAY
CMCI is not going away; it is taking its place under the IMCI umbrella along with other grants and initiatives. We are currently preparing a resubmission of the CMCI Phase II proposal. Because we were funded off-cycle in Phase I, our initial Phase II proposal was submitted early, so we are well positioned financially to remain fully functional during this resubmission cycle.
POSTDOCTORAL RESOURCES EXPANDING
The Postdoctoral Fellows in the Modeling Core have broad expertise including molecular modeling, genomics, mathematical modeling, population genetics, and machine learning. We will soon be adding expertise in geospatial modeling and statistical modeling. On Monday, a new postdoc Hui (William) Wang joined IMCI and will be working on the EPSCoR GEM3 project. Please make William welcome to our community.
THANK YOU, UNIVERSITY LEADERSHIP
I want to acknowledge the University leadership for their strong support of CMCI/IMCI. Vice President for Research & Economic Development Janet Nelson, Provost and Executive Vice President John Wiencek, and President Scott Green have all been extremely positive and supportive during our transition. Dean of the College of Science Ginger Carney has been especially generous in allowing CoS personnel to continue to support us through this changeover. Finally, I want to say that I am enthusiastic and optimistic as President Green assumes leadership and to assure him that I remain ready to support his efforts and the University of Idaho.
Let’s have a great semester!
Go Vandals! Holly
P.S. TAKE THE SURVEY
PS If you haven’t already, please fill complete the CMCI Participation Survey. It should only take you a minute and will help us know how to better serve our CMCI / IMCI participants.
Vision is one of the most sophisticated biochemical system in humans and serves as a primary environmental input. In other organisms, it is the dominant sensory modality for foraging, predator avoidance, and social behaviors including mate selection. Understanding this complex system requires input from a variety of scientific fields. Human visual perception is initiated when light strikes rod and cone photoreceptors within the retina of the eye. Visual pigments (VPs) with distinct peak spectral sensitivities (λmax) expressed in separate rod and cone photoreceptor populations transmit differential input to retinal neurons. The cone VPs (SWS1, SWS2, Rh2, LWS) are responsible for color perception, whereas the rod VPs (Rh1) are responsible for the perception of objects under dim light condition. A VP consists of a chromophore and associated opsin protein, and its sensitivity to individual colors, i.e., λmax of VP is determined by chromophore type (11-cis retinal or 11-cis 3,4-dehydroretinal) and the opsin amino acid sequence. Minor differences in opsin sequence can result in large changes in λmax and/or result in anomalous visual function.
Direct and accurate prediction of λmax from opsin sequence was not possible until recently when we developed a molecular modeling approach for a small number of teleost Rh2 cone opsins (https://journals.plos.org/ploscompbiol/article?id=10.1371/journal.pcbi.1005974) and Rh1 rod opsins (https://science.sciencemag.org/content/364/6440/588) Our approach overcomes several limitations of previous methods and provides a glimpse into underlying mechanisms for a small set of rod and cone opsin variants. In spite of this step forward, there is a significant gap in our understanding of genome to phenome relationships in opsins. Filling this gap has the potential to fundamentally explain λmax, basic “rules” through which opsins evolve novel functions, the molecular basis of missense variations that can lead to vision deficiency and provide a platform for engineering the opsin with desirable characteristics. Currently, our group is interested in expanding our molecular modeling-based approach to other class of opsins and investigating underlying mechanism of missense variations affecting opsin function.
