Valerie Wallace

Biography

Valerie Wallace BSc, PhD Professor Contact information Vision Science Research Program Toronto Western Research Institute, Krembil Discovery Tower 60 Leonard Ave., Rm 8KD413 Toronto Ontario M5T 2S8 Phone: 416-603-5800 Ext: 7378 Fax: 416-603-6274 Email: vwallace@uhnresearch.ca Research location: Toronto Western Hospital/Research Institute (UHN) Primary Research Area: Brain & Neuroscience Secondary Research Area: Cancer Research Statement: The Wallace lab is working on the regulation of neurogenesis and neural progenitor transformation in the vertebrate CNS and regenrative medicine approaches to retina repair.            Valerie Wallace BSc, PhD Professor Contact information Vision Science Research Program Toronto Western Research Institute, Krembil Discovery Tower 60 Leonard Ave., Rm 8KD413 Toronto Ontario M5T 2S8 Phone: 416-603-5800 Ext: 7378 Fax: 416-603-6274 Email: vwallace@uhnresearch.ca Research location: Toronto Western Hospital/Research Institute (UHN) Primary Research Area: Brain & Neuroscience Secondary Research Area: Cancer Research Statement: The Wallace lab is working on the regulation of neurogenesis and neural progenitor transformation in the vertebrate CNS and regenrative medicine approaches to retina repair.           

Research Interest

Research in the Wallace lab is focused on the general problem of how cell number and fate are regulated in the developing brain.  Unraveling how signaling pathways and genes that control these processes is key to understanding brain function but also important for understanding tumorigenesis and degenerative processes.  We use the mammalian retina as a model to address these questions because its development is well characterized and it is a tractable system for experimental manipulation.  General approaches in the lab include conditional mouse mutagenesis and primary retinal cell culture. Our work has identified roles for morphogen signaling in eye patterning and retinal histogenesis.  Projects in the lab include the functional analysis of Hedgehog regulated genes in retinal histogensis and Hh-dependent tumorigenesis, elucidation of the mechanisms of Hedgehog protein trafficking in neurons, and cell transplantation approaches to restore retinal function.