Ronen ZAIDEL-BAR
Department of Cell and Developmental Biology, Sackler Faculty of Medicine, Tel-Aviv University, Israel
Laboratory website
Zaidel-Bar Cell Adhesion Lab
Seeking Postdoctoral Research Fellow in the Vascular Mechano-medicine Lab led by Dr. Shailaja Seetharaman at the Mechanobiology Institute, NUS
We are seeking to recruit a Postdoctoral Research Fellow in the research group of Dr. Shailaja Seetharaman at the Mechanobiology Institute and Department of Physiology at the Yong Loo Lin School of Medicine, NUS.
A Cell Never Forgets: How Prior Environments Affect Confined Cell Migration
Researchers from the Holle Lab at the Mechanobiology Institute, NUS discover that cells retain mechanical memory that influences subsequent migration despite environmental changes, suggesting broader implications for understanding wound healing, fibrosis and cancer metastasis.
The Young Lab Welcome Visitors from Raffles Girls’ School!
The Young Lab hosted visitors from Raffles Girls' School as part of MBI's outreach event.
Force sensing in cells at the single molecule level
Professor Yan Jie and his team from the Mechanobiology Institute collaborated with Professor Liu Xiaogang from the Department of Chemistry, NUS, to determine the exact force needed to activate Piezo1, via a DNA-based approach.
MBI Hosts Students from Raffles Girls School!
MBI hosted students from Raffles Girls School on 28 April 2026, for an outreach session designed to spark curiosity about mechanobiology and research careers.
Farewell Avery, All the Best!
Farewell to Dr. Avery Rui Sun, a former PhD student at the Young Lab from 2021-2026!
Ronen Zaidel-Bar
Visiting Faculty
Currently Visting
6-12 Nov 2018
Office: T-Lab, Level 5
Research Areas
Cell-cell and cell-matrix adhesion, Regulation of actomyosin contractility and dynamics, C. elegans development, mechanics and molecular mechanisms of morphogenesis
Research Interests
- How do specific cytoskeletal proteins contribute to the organization and function of cell adhesion and actomyosin structures?
- How are signals processed within the “adhesome” and “contractome” to arrive at the appropriate cytoskeletal arrangement for a given cell state?
- How do adhesion sites and the cytoskeleton sense and respond to external mechanical forces?
Biography
Dr Zaidel-Bar obtained his Ph.D. working with Prof Benny Geiger (Weizmann Institute of Science) on the role of force in regulating cell-matrix adhesions. Their work first focused on single proteins and evolved to encompass the entire adhesome network. In his Postdoctoral training with Prof Jeff Hardin (University of Wisconsin – Madison) Dr Zaidel-Bar switched from studying cells in culture to employing the genetic model organism C. elegans for the study of cell-cell adhesions during development. Dr Zaidel-Bar was attracted to Singapore by the opening of MBI and was awarded the Singapore National Research Foundation Fellowship for promising young investigators.
Education
PhD Weizmann Institute of Science
Recent Publications
- Bertocchi C, Alegría JJ, Vásquez-Sepúlveda S, Ibanez-Prat R, Srinivasan A, Arrano-Valenzuela I, Castro-Pereira B, Soto-Montandon C, Trujillo-Espergel A, Montenegro-Rojas I, Deguchi S, Owen GI, Kanchanawong P, Cerda M, Motta G, Zaidel-Bar R, and Ravasio A. Systematic AI-assisted screening of the cadhesome to map epithelial monolayer mechanics. Cell Commun Signal 2026;. [PMID: 42399739]
- Ray S, Agarwal P, Nitzan A, Nédélec F, and Zaidel-Bar R. Actin capping protein regulates actomyosin contractility to maintain germline architecture in C. elegans. Development 2023;. [PMID: 36897576]
- Avivi Kela S, Sethi K, Tan PY, Suresh D, Ong HT, Castaneda PG, Amin MR, Laviv T, Cram EJ, Faix J, and Zaidel-Bar R. Tension-dependent RHGF-1 recruitment to stress fibers drives robust spermathecal tissue contraction. J Cell Biol 2022; 222(2). [PMID: 36574264]
- Chen Z, Oh D, Biswas KH, Zaidel-Bar R, and Groves JT. Probing the effect of clustering on EphA2 receptor signaling efficiency by subcellular control of ligand-receptor mobility. Elife 2021; 10. [PMID: 34414885]
- Hu S, Grobe H, Guo Z, Wang Y, Doss BL, Pan M, Ladoux B, Bershadsky AD, and Zaidel-Bar R. Reciprocal regulation of actomyosin organization and contractility in non-muscle cells by tropomyosins and alpha-actinins. Mol. Biol. Cell 2019;:mbcE19020082. [PMID: 31216217]
- Desai SK, Padmanabhan A, Harshe S, Zaidel-Bar R, and Kenney LJ. Salmonella biofilms program innate immunity for persistence in Caenorhabditis elegans. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A. 2019;. [PMID: 31160462]
- Bouffard J, Cecchetelli AD, Clifford C, Sethi K, Zaidel-Bar R, and Cram EJ. The RhoGAP SPV-1 regulates calcium signaling to control the contractility of the C. elegans spermatheca during embryo transits. Mol. Biol. Cell 2019;:mbcE18100633. [PMID: 30726159]
- Priti A, Ong HT, Toyama Y, Padmanabhan A, Dasgupta S, Krajnc M, and Zaidel-Bar R. Syncytial germline architecture is actively maintained by contraction of an internal actomyosin corset. Nat Commun 2018; 9(1):4694. [PMID: 30410005]
- Agarwal P, and Zaidel-Bar R. Principles of Actomyosin Regulation In Vivo. Trends Cell Biol. 2018;. [PMID: 30385150]
- Chen Z, Oh D, Biswas KH, Yu C, Zaidel-Bar R, and Groves JT. Spatially modulated ephrinA1:EphA2 signaling increases local contractility and global focal adhesion dynamics to promote cell motility. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A. 2018;. [PMID: 29866846]
Lab Members
Katherine Anne Lau Enqi
Research Assistant, Young Group
Zhou Hanzhang
Research Fellow, Yu Group
Dongyu Xu
Research Fellow, Yu Group
Li Guang
Research Fellow, Yu Group
Seeking Research Assistant in the research group of Prof. Rong Li at the Mechanobiology Institute, NUS
The Mechanobiology Institute, NUS, seeks to recruit a Research Assistant in the research group of Prof. Rong Li.
Check out the lab’s latest publication and preprint!
Click in for the links to both articles!
Seeking Head of Microfabrication Core Facility at the Mechanobiology Institute, NUS
The Mechanobiology Institute, NUS, seeks to recruit a Facility Manager to heads its Microfabrication Core Facility.
Seeking Postdoctoral Research Fellow (Biomaterials and Mechanobiology) in the group of Asst. Prof. Jennifer Young at the Mechanobiology Institute, NUS
The Mechanobiology Institute, NUS, seeks to recruit a Postdoctoral Research Fellow (Biomaterials and Mechanobiology) in the group of Asst. Prof. Jennifer Young.
Seeking Postdoctoral Research Fellow (Spatial Omics) in the group of Asst. Prof. Jennifer Young at the Mechanobiology Institute, NUS
The Mechanobiology Institute, NUS, seeks to recruit a Postdoctoral Research Fellow (Spatial Omics) in the group of Asst. Prof. Jennifer Young.
Congrats to Kelly and Gefei for passing their Qualifying Exams!
Looking forward to the exciting science ahead!
The Chan Lab is delighted to host visitor Norah Spears from U. Edinburgh!
The scientific exchange was fantastic and we deeply appreciated her sharing her scientific journey. It was both inspiring and humbling for our early career researchers!
She is a Scientist: Confidence Formed by Curiosity Over Time
February 11th celebrates The International Day of Women and Girls in Science to promote full, equal access and participation in STEM fields. MBI talks to two of our posdoctoral research fellows about their career as a woman in science.
