Derek Molliver

Education

Ph.D. Washington University, 1997

Biosketch

Derek Molliver received his B.A. from Williams College in 1988 and went on to complete his PhD in Neuroscience at Washington University in St. Louis in 1997, studying the role of neurotrophic factors in the development of peripheral sensory neuron identity with Dr. William Snider. He then took a postdoctoral fellowship with Dr. Ed McCleskey at the Vollum Institute of Oregon Health and Science University, examining the function of purinergic G protein-coupled receptors (GPCRs) in adult nociceptive sensory neurons. After two years as a Research Associate with Dr. Brian Davis at the University of Pittsburgh, he was appointed in 2004 to Research Assistant Professor of Gastroenterology and in 2006 to Assistant Professor of Gastroenterology and Neurobiology in the newly created Pittsburgh Center for Pain Research. While at the University of Pittsburgh, he managed an NIH-funded research program studying transcriptional and post-translational regulation of nociceptors by neurotrophic factors and purinergic GPCRs. Dr. Molliver joined the University of New England College of Osteopathic Medicine in the Department of Biomedical Sciences as an Associate Professor in the spring of 2014 with an R01 from NIGMS to examine the integration of GPCR signal transduction pathways in inflammatory pain.

Research Interests

Research in the Molliver lab focuses on the molecular machinery that controls signal transduction in pain-sensing neurons and the changes in that machinery that underlie the transition from acute to chronic pain. In pursuit of those themes, research in the lab examines mechanisms that regulate the integration of distinct signal transduction pathways to determine neuronal response properties, with an emphasis on protein-protein interactions and activity-dependent translational regulation. A second project examines communication between peripheral sensory neurons and resident immune cells. From a technical perspective, the lab uses a set of complementary techniques designed to analyze signal transduction mechanisms from individual neurons to the whole animal, including in vitro functional assays (biochemical analyses of cell signaling, ratiometric calcium imaging), protein identification and localization (immunohistochemistry, multiplex Western blotting, 2D DIGE, mass spectrometry), single cell PCR and in vivo behavioral assays.

Grants