Chelsey, Ana, James and Sam recently c0-authored a paper for Developmental Biology investigating the role of Semaphorin3A (Sema3A), a cell guidance chemorepellent, on angioblast migration and corneal avascularity during development. Please check it out! Chelsey C. McKenna, Ana Ojeda, James W Spurlin, Sam Kwiatkowski and Peter Lwigale. Sema3A maintains corneal avascularity during development by inhibiting Vegf induced angioblast migration. Dev Biol. 2014 Jul 15;391(2):241-50. doi: 10.1016/j.ydbio.2014.04.017.

James recently authored a paper for IOVS describing how minimal keratocyte activation, rapid ECM reconstruction, and proper innervation occur during non-fibrotic regeneration of the embryonic cornea. Please check it out! James W Spurlin, III and Peter Lwigale. Wounded Embryonic Corneas Exhibit Non-fibrotic Regeneration and Complete Innervation. Invest. Ophthalmol. Vis. Sci. September 3, 2013 IOVS-13-12504. 

Welcome to Colette Kendrick, a senior undergraduate at Rice, who will be working on corneal structure and dynamics with Sinu. Welcome, Colette! Welcome to Mackenzie Nettlow, also a senior undergraduate at Rice, who will be working on corneal avascularity with Sam. Welcome, Mackenzie! Welcome to Kassandra Rivera, who will be working on corneal wound healing with…

Chelsey received The George R. Schroepfer, Jr. Award for Outstanding Ph.D. Thesis in Biochemistry & Cell Biology. She also got First Place at Rice University/Texas Medical Center Chapter of Sigma Xi 2013 Thesis Awards. Bravo!