Assistant Professor, Department of Biology
Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute

Education:
Ph.D., Cell Biology, Yale University
M.S., Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, University of Chicago
A.B., Biology, Magna Cum Laude, Cornell University

Career Highlights:
Prior to joining the biology faculty at Rensselaer, Finger was a Damon Runyon Cancer Research Fund Postdoctoral Fellow in the Laboratory of Molecular Biology at the University of Wisconsin for three years. She also spent a year and a half as a research fellow at the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center.

Finger has presented several invited lectures to such forums as the 14th International C. elegans Conference in Los Angeles (2003), the East Coast Worm Meeting (2002 and 2004), and The American Society for Cell Biology (ASCB) in Washington, D.C. (2001). Among the honors she has received include a Scientist Development Grant from the American Heart Association for her septins research.

Her professional society memberships include the ASCB, the Genetics Society of America, the Society for Developmental Biology, and the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

Research Areas:
Research in Finger’s laboratory is focused on understanding the developmental functions of a family of conserved guanosine triphosphate (GTP) -binding proteins, the septins, using the nematode worm Caenorhabditis elegans as a model system. The septins have been mostly studied for their role in cytokinesis in fungi and animals, and are also implicated in a number of human cancers and neurodegenerative diseases. Surprisingly, the two worm septins, UNC-59 and UNC-61, are not required for the embryonic cell divisions, enabling their other developmental functions to be studied. Finger has previously identified novel roles for the septins in axonal migration during nervous system development and in cellular migration during organogenesis of the gonad.

To explore the roles of septins in various aspects of cell function required for cell division and development, her laboratory uses a combination of approaches from classical and molecular genetics, to cell biology and biochemistry. Current projects in the Finger laboratory include in vitro studies of the cytoskeleton and membranes during axonal migration in primary cultures of neurons derived from normal and septin mutant worms, studies of cell migration and process extension in wild-type worms and in strains bearing septin mutations, studies to clarify the role of septins in organogenesis of the pharynx, structure-function studies of the septins, and screens to identify novel septin interactors. Her group’s working hypothesis is that septins organize the cell cortex into distinct functional domains required for localized motility and organization of cellular processes.

Selected Publications:
F.P. Finger, “Interdependence of the Contractile Ring and Spindle Midzone in Cleavage Plane Maintenance,” Cell Cycle, 2, 553-554, (2003).

F.P. Finger, K.R. Kopish, and J.G. White, “A Role for Septins in Cellular and Axonal Migration in C. elegans,” Developmental Biology, 261, 220-234, (2003).

F.P. Finger, “One Ring to Bind Them: Septins and Actin Assembly,” Developmental Cell, 3, (6), 761-763, (2002).

F.P. Finger and J.G. White, “Fusion and Fission: Membrane Trafficking in Animal Cytokinesis,” Cell, 108, (6), 727-730, (2002).

F.P. Finger and P. Novick, “Synthetic Interactions of the Post-Golgi sec Mutations of Saccharomyces cerevisiae, Genetics, 156, 943-951, (2000).

F.P. Finger and P. Novick, Spatial Regulation of Exocytosis: Lessons from Yeast, Journal of Cell Biology, 142, (3), 609-612, (1998).

F.P. Finger, T.E. Hughes, and P. Novick, “Sec3p is a Spatial Landmark for Polarized Secretion in Budding Yeast,” Cell, 92, (4), 559-571, (1998).

F.P. Finger and P. Novick, “Sec3p is Involved in Secretion and Morphogenesis in Saccharomyces cerevisiae, Molecular Biology of the Cell, 8, 647-662, (1997).

P. Novick, M.D. Garrett, P. Brennwald, A. Lauring, F.P. Finger, R. Collins, and D.R. TerBush, “Control of Exocytosis in Yeast,” Cold Spring Harbor Symposium on Quantitative Biology, 60, 171-177, (1995).

N. Quarto, F.P. Finger, and D.B. Rifkin, “The NH2-Terminal Extension of High Molecular Weight bFGF is a Nuclear Targeting Signal,” Journal of Cellular Physiology, 147, 311-318, (1991).

Contact Information:
Fern Finger
(518) 276-6031
fingef@rpi.edu
http://j2ee.rpi.edu/biology/update.do?artcenterkey=13