Ronen ZAIDEL-BAR
Department of Cell and Developmental Biology, Sackler Faculty of Medicine, Tel-Aviv University, Israel
Laboratory website
Zaidel-Bar Cell Adhesion Lab
Nishanth Venugopal Menon
Senior Research Fellow, Lim Group
Prof Rong Li elected President of the American Society for Cell Biology for 2026
MBI Director Professor Rong Li, has been elected by members of the American Society for Cell Biology (ASCB) to serve as President of the Society in 2026. She will serve as President-Elect on the ASCB Executive Committee beginning 1 January 2025, before starting her term as President on 1 January 2026.
Prof Lim Chwee Teck elected Fellow of the Royal Society
MBI Principal Investigator Professor Lim Chwee Teck, Director of the Institute for Health Innovation & Technology at the National University of Singapore (NUS iHealthtech) and NUSS Professor, has been elected to the prestigious Fellowship of the Royal Society
The first research article from the Chan Lab is up on bioRxiv now
Congratulations to Arikta for driving this project!
Congrats to Kim Whye, Boon Heng and Kosei for their accomplishments at the SCBS Annual Conference 2024!
Congratulations to Kim Whye and Boon Heng (below) for presenting their latest research on ovarian follicle development and to Kosei for being awarded the 'Best Poster Prize' at the SCBS Annual Conference 2024.
Seeking Research Assistant in Assoc. Prof. Low Boon Chuan’s Lab at MBI, NUS
We seek to recruit a Research Assistant in Assoc Prof. Low Boon Chuan's Lab at the Mechanobiology Institute, NUS.
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
What is the cellular origin of hematopoietic stem cells?
What is the cellular origin of hematopoietic stem cells? Based on findings from a large number of anatomical, biochemical, and genetic studies carried out over the years, three major theories have been put forth [...]
What are cell-cell adhesions?
What are cell-cell adhesions? Cell-cell signaling refers to inter-cellular communication through the transduction of chemical, mechanical or electrical signals, facilitated by the formation of specialized cell-cell adhesion junctions. There are three main types of [...]
How are cell-cell adhesions regulated?
How are cell-cell adhesions regulated? Introduction to the regulation of cell-cell adhesion The assembly and disassembly of cell-cell junctions, such as adherens junctions (AJ), are regulated by a vast array of factors functioning in [...]
How do post-translational modifications of cell-cell adhesions impact their stability?
How do post-translational modifications of cell-cell adhesions impact their stability? Post-translational modification of adhesion complex components is one of the most complicated aspects in the regulation of cell-cell adhesions. It involves an array of [...]
What are anchoring junctions?
What are anchoring junctions? Cells adhere to the ECM, or to other cells, via complexes that can collectively be called anchoring junctions (reviewed in [1][2]). These multiprotein complexes are found in all cell types [...]
What are selectins?
What are selectins? Members of the selectin family, E-selectin (endothelial), L-selectin (leukocyte) and P-selectin (platelet), all of which bind to fucosylated carbohydrates [1]. For example P-selectin on leukocytes binds PSGL-1 (P-selectin glycoprotein ligand-1) on [...]
What are tight junctions?
What are tight junctions? Tight junctions, also known as Zonula Occludens, are cell-cell adhesion complexes that play a role in the organization of epithelial tissue. By forming a meshwork of membrane contacts around the [...]
How are tight junctions assembled?
How are tight junctions assembled? The epithelial tissue is held intact by the formation of tight junctions between cells. The basic functional units that form adhesive contacts across cells are the tight junction strands, [...]
What are adherens junctions?
What are adherens junctions? Adherens junctions (AJs) are cell-cell adhesion complexes that are continuously assembled and disassembled, allowing cells within a tissue to respond to forces, biochemical signals and structural changes in their microenvironment. [...]
How are adherens junctions assembled?
How are adherens junctions assembled? Introduction to the Assembly of Adherens Junctions In situations where migrating cells first encounter each other to form junctions, changes in cellular morphology have been observed and correlated with [...]
What are immunoglobulin superfamily cell adhesion molecules?
What are immunoglobulin superfamily cell adhesion molecules? Members of the Immunoglobulin superfamily include vascular and neural cell adhesions molecules (VCAM and NCAM), intercellular adhesion molecules (ICAM) and the Nectins and nectin-like (Necl) proteins. Nectins [...]
What is the role of adaptor proteins in the stabilization and function of core adherens junction components?
What is the role of adaptor proteins in the stabilization and function of core adherens junction components? Recruitment of plaque proteins to adherens junctions The difficulties in establishing a direct link between the α-catenin–β-catenin [...]
