Tia J. Kowal, PhD
Stanford University
Palo Alto, California
Project Title: The Role of Primary Cilia for Retinal Ganglion Cells
Palo Alto, California
After graduating from Lehigh University, Bethlehem, Pennsylvania with a PhD in cell and molecular biology, Dr. Kowal began her postdoctoral career at Stanford University in Palo Alto, California. Her research interests are to identify the subtype(s) of retinal ganglion cells (RGC) that have primary cilia and determine what role the primary cilia is playing in the function of that specific RGC subtype(s). Dr. Kowal explains that her PhD training at Lehigh University spanned multiple disciplines including cell-material interactions, cell differentiation, cellular morphology, and tissue regeneration. Her research also covered multiple tissue types such as bone, skin, and reproductive tissues, resulting in a publication on primary cilia. (Kowal, Tia J., Falk, Matthias M. 2015. Primary cilia on HeLa and other cancer cells. Cell Biol Int. 2015. November; 39(11): 1341-1347.)