William Green, University of Chicago
Professor
Chicago, Illinois
wgreen@uchicago.edu
Office:
(773) 702-1763
Expert In
Bio/Research
My research is focused on ionotropic neurotransmitter receptors, the receptors responsible for the rapid postsynaptic response in nerve and muscle. These receptors are large oligomeric membrane proteins with subunits surrounding an ion channel that opens when neurotransmitters bind to the recepto...
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Bio/Research
My research is focused on ionotropic neurotransmitter receptors, the receptors responsible for the rapid postsynaptic response in nerve and muscle. These receptors are large oligomeric membrane proteins with subunits surrounding an ion channel that opens when neurotransmitters bind to the receptor. There are two different families of ionotropic neurotransmitter receptors. One family includes nicotinic acetylcholine receptors (AChRs), GABA and glycine receptors, and the other family are glutamate receptors, both NMDA- and AMPA-type glutamate receptors. The overall goal of my research is to understand how nerve and muscle build these receptors and traffic them specifically to and from synapses. These events regulate the number, density and function of the receptors at synapses, which helps define synaptic strength. The same events underlie learning and memory formation, and when they fail, can contribute to a number of diseases including Alzheimer’s disease, Huntington’s Disease, Myasthenia Gravis and Myasthenic Syndromes.
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