Calvin Prof Gets Grant of Almost $200,000

February 19, 2004 == MEDIA ADVISORY

When Steve Matheson was applying to Calvin College for a job as biology
professor his post-doctoral advisor at Harvard Medical School thought the
school's location in Grand Rapids rang a bell.

"So he looked in his datebook," says Matheson, "and he says: 'Art Alberts is
in Grand Rapids. He's at the Van Andel (Research Institute).' Which got me
excited because Alberts and my advisor are good friends. And Art and I study
the same protein. I figured if I was fortunate enough to get the job at Calvin
I'd be able to work with Art too."

As it turned out Matheson did get the job at Calvin. And the first summer he
was in town he and two Calvin students spent 10 weeks conducting experiments
with Alberts at the Van Andel Research Institute.

Now the collaboration is bearing further fruit. Matheson has just received a
grant of $189,470 to continue his research on nerve cells, specifically the
actions of signaling proteins called diaphanous-related formins, or DRFs. The
grant comes from the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke
under the auspices of the Department of Health and Human Services.

DRFs are part of Matheson's research on spinal cord injury - "think
Christopher Reeve," he says.

One of the key research challenges right now as far as spinal cord injury is
figuring out if it's possible to get nerve cells to regrow. Matheson calls
this the holy grail of spinal cord research. DRFs, he says, are an unknown in
the whole nerve cell regeneration process.

"We do know," he says, "that Rho proteins are involved in nerve cell
development. And that Rho proteins turn on DRFs. But we know essentially
nothing about the roles of DRFs in the nervous system, at any stage of
development. The question is could they play a role in the regrowth of damaged
nerve cells. Nobody knows. We're hoping that our research will yield some
answers."

Most of the work will take place at Calvin, where, Matheson says, the new
DeVries Hall make scientific research a pleasure. Indeed Matheson will make
good use of Calvin's new flow cytometer, a specialized instrument usually found
in hospitals, research labs and large, graduate-level universities, that Calvin
installed last fall thanks to a $225,000 National Science Foundation grant.
And some experiments will take place at Van Andel Research Institute.

Matheson also anticipates using two parttime students each school year and two
fulltime student assistants every summer, using the grant monies to pay their
salaries. He says the quality of Calvin's students makes using student help a
no-brainer.

"Our top students," he says, "compare to the top students at any college in
the country. The Van Andel Research Institute can't get enough of them. For
me to have their assistance is an easy decision."

Matheson has a Ph.D. in neuroscience from the University of Arizona and hopes
that he is able to convey to his students the same excitement he felt the first
time he took a course on the human brain some two decades ago.

"The brain still has a sort of frontier feel about it," he says. "There is so
ridiculously much about it we don't understand. In my research I'm playing
with cells and how they work and somehow it all adds up to a brain that can
move muscles and have conversations and do all kinds of amazing things. It's
exhilarating.

Contact Matheson at 616-526-6143 or matheso@calvin.edu

-end-
Received on Thu Feb 19 09:42:46 2004