Vanessa Ruta

Vanessa Julia Ruta, Ph.D. is an American neuroscientist known for her work on the structure and function of chemosensory circuits underlying innate and learned behaviors in the fly Drosophila melanogaster. She is the Gabrielle H. Reem and Herbert J. Kayden Associate Professor and Head of the Laboratory of Neurophysiology and Behavior at The Rockefeller University.[1]

Vanessa Ruta
Vanessa Ruta at Rockefeller University in 2015
Born
Chiapas, Mexico
CitizenshipUnited States
Alma mater
Spouse(s)Rickie Mohan
Awards
Scientific career
FieldsNeuroscience
InstitutionsRockefeller University
Doctoral advisorRoderick MacKinnon
Other academic advisorsRichard Axel, Robert Barlow Jr.
Websitewww.rockefeller.edu/our-scientists/heads-of-laboratories/989-vanessa-ruta/

Ruta is a 2019 MacArthur Fellow. She was one of the six fellows from New York City.[2]

Education and scientific career

Ruta graduated summa cum laude from Hunter College in Chemistry in 2000. She went on to perform doctoral research in the laboratory of Rod Mackinnon, earning her Ph.D. in Biology from The Rockefeller University in 2005. In Mackinnon's lab, she played a critical role in solving the structure of the voltage-dependent potassium ion channel. Her graduate work investigated the structural biology and function of potassium channels. These deeply conserved proteins conduct ions across biological membranes and are targets of toxin including those produced by the tarantula. Vanessa worked out the mechanism by which spider toxins bind the voltage sensor domain of potassium channels. As a postdoctoral fellow with Richard Axel at Columbia University, Ruta switched fields to the analysis of how the brain encodes both innate and learned stimuli and discovered a sexually dimorphic circuit that drives male fly responses to a pheromone,[3] and traced the activity of the circuit from the periphery to the motor output.[4] She joined the faculty at The Rockefeller University in 2011.[5]

Career

In work that bridged her postdoc and the establishment of her own independent group her at Rockefeller University, Ruta demonstrated that the mushroom body encodes information using a rewriteable random access memory architecture.[6] Her lab has elucidated brain circuits that control male fly responses to female pheromones,[7] demonstrated that the memory center of the fly brain uses compartmentalized dopamine modulation to encode behaviors,[8] described the evolution of central neural circuits underlying courtship decisions in Drosophila [9] and solved the structure of the invertebrate olfactory receptor co-receptor (Orco).[10]

Her work on the structure of insect odorant receptors—a potential target for new insect repellents—has been funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.[11]

Ruta is a member of the selection committee of the Perl-UNC Neuroscience Prize[12]

Awards and honors

For her PhD work, Ruta received the Harold M. Weintraub Graduate Student Award in 2005. She has received a number of junior faculty awards, including the New York Stem Cell Foundation–Robertson Neuroscience Investigator Award (2012), the McKnight Neuroscience Scholar Award (2012), the Pew Biomedical Scholar Award (2012), the Sinsheimer Fund Scholar Award (2012), the Irma T. Hirschl/Monique Weill-Caulier Trust Research Award (2013), and the Alfred P. Sloan Research Fellowship in Neuroscience (2013). In 2013, Ruta received the National Institutes of Health Director’s New Innovator Award, for a project that aims to connect neural plasticity to learning and memory.[13] She was named a MacArthur Foundation Fellow in 2019.[14][15][16]

Personal life

Ruta is the daughter of the 20th Century landscape painter Peter Ruta.[17] She spent her early childhood in New York City and Santa Fe, New Mexico.[17] Ruta returned to New York City to live in the Westbeth Artists Community in Greenwich Village, and she attended Stuyvesant High School.[18] Between high school and college, Ruta was a professional ballet dancer.[18] She is the sister of journalist Garance Franke-Ruta. Ruta married graphic designer Rickie Mohan in 2001.[19]

References
  1. "The Rockefeller University » Scientists & Research". Rockefeller.edu. Retrieved 2017-03-09.
  2. Joan Gralla (2019-09-25). "LIer a 2019 MacArthur 'genius' grant recipient". Newsday. Retrieved 2019-09-29. Six geniuses live in New York City: theater artist Annie Dorsen, 45; Mary Halvorson, 38, a jazz and rock guitarist and composer; Saidiya Hartman, 58, a Columbia University professor who traced "the aftermath of slavery in modern American life"; contemporary dance choreographer Sarah Michelson, 55; artist Cameron Rowland, 30, for portraying systemic racism; and neuroscientist Vanessa Ruta, 45, who explores stimuli that affect neural circuits and behaviors, the foundation said.
  3. Datta, Sandeep Robert; Vasconcelos, Maria Luisa; Ruta, Vanessa; Luo, Sean; Wong, Allan; Demir, Ebru; Flores, Jorge; Balonze, Karen; Dickson, Barry J; Axel, Richard (2008). "The Drosophila pheromone cVA activates a sexually dimorphic neural circuit". Nature. 452 (7186): 473–7. Bibcode:2008Natur.452..473D. doi:10.1038/nature06808. PMID 18305480.
  4. Ruta, Vanessa; Datta, Sandeep Robert; Vasconcelos, Maria Luisa; Freeland, Jessica; Looger, Loren L; Axel, Richard (2010). "A dimorphic pheromone circuit in Drosophila from sensory input to descending output". Nature. 468 (7324): 686–90. Bibcode:2010Natur.468..686R. doi:10.1038/nature09554. PMID 21124455.
  5. "Rockefeller alum Vanessa Ruta named to university's faculty". Newswire.rockefeller.edu. Retrieved 2017-03-10.
  6. Caron, Sophie J. C; Ruta, Vanessa; Abbott, L. F; Axel, Richard (2013). "Random convergence of olfactory inputs in the Drosophila mushroom body". Nature. 497 (7447): 113–7. Bibcode:2013Natur.497..113C. doi:10.1038/nature12063. PMC 4148081. PMID 23615618.
  7. Clowney, E. Josephine; Iguchi, Shinya; Bussell, Jennifer J; Scheer, Elias; Ruta, Vanessa (2015). "Multimodal Chemosensory Circuits Controlling Male Courtship in Drosophila". Neuron. 87 (5): 1036–49. doi:10.1016/j.neuron.2015.07.025. PMC 4560615. PMID 26279475.
  8. Cohn, Raphael; Morantte, Ianessa; Ruta, Vanessa (2015). "Coordinated and Compartmentalized Neuromodulation Shapes Sensory Processing in Drosophila". Cell. 163 (7): 1742–55. doi:10.1016/j.cell.2015.11.019. PMC 4732734. PMID 26687359.
  9. Seeholzer, Laura F.; Seppo, Max; Stern, David L.; Ruta, Vanessa (July 2018). "Evolution of a central neural circuit underlies Drosophila mate preferences". Nature. 559 (7715): 564–569. Bibcode:2018Natur.559..564S. doi:10.1038/s41586-018-0322-9. ISSN 1476-4687. PMC 6276375. PMID 29995860.
  10. Butterwick, J. A.; Del Mármol, J.; Kim, K. H.; Kahlson, M. A.; Rogow, J. A.; Walz, T.; Ruta, V. (2018). "Cryo-EM structure of the insect olfactory receptor Orco". Nature. 560 (7719): 447–452. Bibcode:2018Natur.560..447B. doi:10.1038/s41586-018-0420-8. PMC 6129982. PMID 30111839.
  11. "New Gates Grant Supports CUMC Malaria Research - Columbia University Medical Center". Cumc.columbia.edu. 27 August 2010. Retrieved 18 October 2017.
  12. "Caltech researcher David Anderson wins Perl-UNC Neuroscience Prize". EurekAlert.org. Retrieved 18 October 2017.
  13. "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 2017-09-17. Retrieved 2017-09-17.CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
  14. https://hunter.cuny.edu/news/hunter-alumna-vanessa-ruta-00-takes-home-macarthur-grant/. Missing or empty |title= (help)
  15. https://www.rockefeller.edu/news/26578-vanessa-ruta-named-a-2019-macarthur-fellow/. Missing or empty |title= (help)
  16. https://www.macfound.org/fellows/1049/. Missing or empty |title= (help)
  17. "Peter Ruta: The Oldest Living Painter in Westbeth". Tabletmag.com. February 2016. Retrieved 18 October 2017.
  18. "Alumna Vanessa Ruta named to university's faculty - News". Reckefeller.edu. Retrieved 18 October 2017.
  19. "Vanessa Ruta, Rickie Mohan". The New York Times. 16 September 2001. Retrieved 18 October 2017.
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