Andrew P Capaldi, PhD
Cancer Biology Program
Biography
Dr. Capaldi obtained his Ph.D. in 1999 studying protein folding at the University of Leeds with Professor Sheena Radford. He gained additional post-doctoral training engineering yeast transcriptional networks with Erin O’Shea at Harvard University. During this time, he had an appointment as a Howard Hughes Medical Institute Fellow (2003-2006). In 2009, he secured an appointment as an Assistant Professor at the University of Arizona in the Department of Molecular and Cellular Biology where he started to dissect yeast metabolic circuitry using genetic, genomic, and proteomic methods. He was promoted to Associate Professor with tenure in 2016.
Cancer Focus
Dr. Capaldi is interested in determining how cells sense stress and starvation signals, integrate the relevant information, and then decide (1) how fast to grow and (2) which pathways to activate to support growth and survival. To address these questions, his lab uses high-throughput genetic, genomic, modelling, live cell imaging, and biochemical approaches to investigate the circuitry of growth and survival signaling pathways. These circuits allow cells to process information and make decisions. Using yeast as a model system, they are able to reverse engineer the cell growth circuitry and identify basic biological mechanisms that drive cancer cell growth and survival and identify potential targets for investigation in cancer systems.
Selected Publications
Steidle, E. A., V. A. Morrissette, K. Fujimaki, L. Chong, A. C. Resnick, A. P. Capaldi, and R. J. Rolfes, "The InsP phosphatase Siw14 regulates inositol pyrophosphate levels to control localization of the general stress response transcription factor Msn2.", J Biol Chem, vol. 295, issue 7, pp. 2043-2056, 2020 02 14. PMCID: PMC7029108 PMID: 31848224
Kunkel, J., X. Luo, and A. P. Capaldi, "Integrated TORC1 and PKA signaling control the temporal activation of glucose-induced gene expression in yeast.", Nat Commun, vol. 10, issue 1, pp. 3558, 2019 08 08. PMCID: PMC6687784 PMID: 31395866
Sullivan, A., R. L. Wallace, R. Wellington, X. Luo, and A. P. Capaldi, "Multilayered regulation of TORC1-body formation in budding yeast.", Mol Biol Cell, vol. 30, issue 3, pp. 400-410, 2019 02 01. PMCID: PMC6589571 PMID: 30485160
Hallett, J. E. Hughes, X. Luo, and A. P. Capaldi, "Snf1/AMPK promotes the formation of Kog1/Raptor-bodies to increase the activation threshold of TORC1 in budding yeast.", Elife, vol. 4, 2015 Oct 06. PMCID: PMC4686425 PMID: 26439012
Worley, J., X. Luo, and A. P. Capaldi, "Inositol pyrophosphates regulate cell growth and the environmental stress response by activating the HDAC Rpd3L.", Cell Rep, vol. 3, issue 5, pp. 1476-82, 2013 May 30. PMCID: PMC3672359 PMID: 23643537