Professor Jennifer Stow

NHMRC Leadership Fellow

Institute for Molecular Bioscience
j.stow@imb.uq.edu.au
+61 7 334 62034
+61 7 334 62159

Overview

Professor Jennifer Stow is a molecular cell biologist, an NHMRC Leadership Fellow and head of the Protein Trafficking and Inflammation research laboratory in The University of Queensland’s Institute of Molecular Bioscience (IMB). Her previous leadership appointments include as Division Head and Deputy Director (Research) at IMB (12 years) and she currently serves on national and international advisory boards, editorial boards and steering committees, and as an elected Associate Member of the European Molecular Biology Organisation (EMBO).

Jenny Stow received her undergraduate and PhD qualifications at Melbourne’s Monash University before undertaking postdoctoral training in the Department of Cell Biology at Yale University School of Medicine, USA. With training as a microscopist in kidney research, she gained further experience at Yale as a postdoc in the lab of eminent cell biologist and microscopist, Dr Marilyn Farquhar, where protein trafficking was both a theme and a passion. Jenny then took up her first faculty appointment as an Assistant Professor in the Renal Unit at Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) and Harvard Medical School in Boston USA, where her research uncovered new roles for a class of enzymes, GTPases, in regulating trafficking within cells. At MGH her research also formed part of a highly successful NIH Renal Cell Biology Program. In late 1994, Jenny moved her research lab back to Australia, to The University of Queensland, in late 1994 as a Wellcome Trust International Medical Research Fellow. As part of IMB since, the Stow lab has continued a focus on protein trafficking, including pioneering live-cell imaging, to spearhead their work on trafficking in inflammation, cancer and chronic disease. Major discoveries include identifying new proteins and pathways for recycling adhesion proteins in epithelial cells, inflammatory cytokine secretion in macrophages and immune signalling through Toll-like receptors in inflammation and infection. Small GTPases of the Rab family, signalling adaptors and kinases feature among the molecules studied in the Stow lab for their functional roles and their potential as drug targets in inflammation and cancer. A keen focus is to understand the role of the fluid uptake pathway, macropinocytosis, in controlling inflammation, cancer and mucosal absorption.

Professor Stow has been awarded multiple career fellowships including from American Heart Association, Wellcome Trust and NHMRC. She has published >200 papers, cited over 15,500 times and she is the recipient of awards and honours, most recently including the 2019 President's Medal from the Australia and New Zealand Society for Cell and Developmental Biology. She is also academic head of IMB Microscopy, a world-class fluorescence microscopy and image analysis facility. Her research is funded by a variety of agencies and industry partnerships, in addition to NHMRC and ARC, including through the ARC Centre of Excellence in Quantum Biotechnology, QUBIC. The Stow lab work with national and international collaborators and welcome students and postdoctoral trainees to participate in their research. We value having a diverse, inclusive and supportive culture for research and celebrate the many diverse and wonderful successes of Stow lab alumni.

Research Interests

  • Controlling Inflammation: Receptor Signalling and Cytokine Secretion.
    Immune cells like macrophages are activated by contact with pathogens and other stimuli, triggering protective immune and inflammatory responses. Signalling pathways generated by macrophage Toll-like receptors (TLRs) elicit the synthesis and secretion of pro- and anti-inflammatory cytokines. These cytokines instruct other cells to mount either anti-microbial attack responses, followed by tissue repair responses, that over time, control and suppress inflammation. Disrupting the finely tuned TLR signalling pathways and release of cytokines leads to the inflammatory tissue damage that accompanies many chronic diseases. Our research investigates the roles of TLR signalling regulators, including coreceptors, signalling adaptors, lipid kinases and GTPases that help to bias and control cytokine programming. While current therapies target the cytokines themselves, our research is generating strategies to target additional regulatory molecules to control inflammation in disease.
  • Cellular Pathways to and from the Cell Surface.
    Cells have intimate contact with their tissue environments and each other through many cell surface projections and trafficking pathways that move proteins, membranes and other matter into and out of cells. Live cell imaging and microscopy reveal these behaviours at molecular, cellular and tissue levels. Our research examines the surface features (ruffles, filopodia, cilia) and cellular pathways (macropinocytosis, secretory and recycling pathways) in macrophages, other immune cells, epithelial cells and cancer cells that give each of them specialised functions. As revealed by our research, many of these pathways are governed by small GTPases of the Rab family and their effector molecules. Understanding these pathways is important in disease, for instance, immunity, inflammation and cancer metastasis are all dependent on the Rab-mediated macropinocytosis or cell drinking pathways we investigate.

Research Impacts

Understanding how cells and molecules within our bodies function is essential for understanding and addressing diseases and other factors that affect our biology, such as genetics, environment, drugs and bugs. Cells contain remarkably complex pathways for trafficking, or moving proteins around, and for the receptor signalling that controls cell responses. Many of these pathways are affected in disease and are also the targets for drugs we use to treat disease. Insights gained from our research generate a fundamental understanding of cell biology as a necessary framework for developing new treatment strategies. Poorly controlled inflammation is a pervasive disease process underlying many chronic diseases and our research on immune cells is uncovering how inflammation is normally controlled within cells. This information is instructive for devising strategies and identifying drugs that are likely to control inflammation in different chronic diseases and in cancer.

Our work takes advantage of the cutting-edge rsearch facilities in IMB at The University of Queensland, and we collaborate with many valued colleagues throughout Australia and around the world. Technologically, it is a very exciting time for biological and biomedical research, with the rapid development of new types of microscopy, laser imaging, big-image data computing, artificial intelligence and virtual reality capabilities for visualising and analysing living cells and tissues. Our research is part of national and global efforts to refine and apply the latest imaging and big data technologies to resolve structures and processes in normal cells and in cells affected by disease.

Qualifications

  • Doctor of Philosophy, Monash University
  • Bachelor (Honours) of Science (Advanced), Monash University

Publications

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Grants

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Supervision

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Publications

Featured Publications

Book Chapter

  • Stow, J.L. and Murray, R.Z. (2023). Post-Golgi Transport - Cargo, Carriers, and Pathways. Encyclopedia of Cell Biology. (pp. 507-515) Amsterdam, Netherlands: Elsevier. doi: 10.1016/b978-0-12-821618-7.20035-7

  • Tong, Samuel J., Lucas, Richard M., Xiao, Zhijian, Luo, Lin and Stow, Jennifer L. (2021). Detecting Endogenous Rab8 Activation. Rab GTPases: Methods and Protocols. (pp. 45-56) New York, NY United States: Humana Press. doi: 10.1007/978-1-0716-1346-7_4

  • Condon, Nicholas D., Wall, Adam A., Yeo, Jeremy C., Hamilton, Nicholas A. and Stow, Jennifer L. (2017). Image-based analysis of phagocytosis: measuring engulfment and internalization. In Roberto Botelho (Ed.), Phagocytosis and phagosomes: methods and protocols (pp. 201-214) New York, NY, United States: Humana Press. doi:10.1007/978-1-4939-6581-6_13

  • Stow, J. L. and Murray, R. Z. (2016). Post-golgi transport - cargo, carriers, and pathways. Encyclopedia of cell biology. (pp. 363-370) edited by Ralph A. Bradshaw and Philip D. Stahl. Waltham, MA, United States: Academic Press/Elsevier. doi: 10.1016/B978-0-12-394447-4.20035-7

  • Gual-Soler, Marga, Taguchi, Tomohiko, Stow, Jennifer L. and Wicking, Carol (2012). Rab23. Encyclopedia of signalling molecules. (pp. 1532-1536) edited by Sangdun Choi. New York, United States: Springer. doi: 10.1007/978-1-4419-0461-4

  • Stow, J. L. and Teasdale, R. D. (2005). Expression and localization of proteins in mammalian cells. Encyclopedia of Genetics, Genomics, Proteomics and Bioformatics. (pp. ---) edited by P S E Little and J S E Quackenbush. London, England: John Wiley & Sons. doi: 10.1002/047001153x.g208202

Journal Article

Conference Publication

Grants (Administered at UQ)

PhD and MPhil Supervision

Current Supervision

  • Doctor Philosophy — Principal Advisor

  • Doctor Philosophy — Principal Advisor

    Other advisors:

  • Doctor Philosophy — Associate Advisor

  • Doctor Philosophy — Associate Advisor

Completed Supervision