Michael Pargett

The paper introduces a far-red FRET biosensor for AMPK activity, enabling multiplexed imaging of single-cell bioenergetic homeostasis and reveals kinetic coupling between AMPK and ATP/ADP ratio.

This paper develops two red-FRET ERK biosensors, REKAR67 and REKAR76, which operate in the 670-720 nm range and are spectrally compatible with existing biosensors for single-cell ERK activity measurement.

The paper develops a framework to infer ERK signaling dynamics from fixed-cell immunostains by combining machine learning and differential equations, showing that protein levels reflect different activation timescales.

The paper shows pro-inflammatory cytokines induce SPREADs in human airway epithelial cells, correlating with barrier dysfunction, and that anti-inflammatory drugs suppress these SPREADs.

The paper quantifies ERK activity in RAS-mutant cells and finds that mutant KRAS isoforms produce similar ERK output ranges despite differing biochemical activity, due to pathway-level rescaling mechanisms.

The paper shows that EGFR/Ras/ERK signaling in invasive breast cancer cells produces more dynamic and disordered ERK activity, leading to heterogeneous gene expression compared to non-malignant cells.