Lee E. Limbird, Ph.D., at the time of this lecture, was Professor of Pharmacology and Associate Vice Chancellor for Research at the Vanderbilt University Medical Center. From 1990 to 1998 she served as Professor and Chair of the Department of Pharmacology at Vanderbilt. The focus of her research has been on the structure of the alpha2-adrenergic receptor and the molecular basis for its functions in cells and, using genetic manipulations of the mouse as a tool, in vivo. Dr. Limbird received a B.A. in Chemistry from the College of Wooster (OH) and a Ph.D. in biochemistry from the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill. She joined the faculty at Vanderbilt University after postdoctoral work with Dr. Robert Lefkowitz at Duke University.

Dr. Limbird has many honors including a MERIT award from the NIH and the John Jacob Abel Award from American Society for Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics (ASPET). Dr. Limbird served as Chair of the Pharmacology Study Section at NIH and as a member of the National Advisory Committee of the Burroughs Wellcome Foundation. She served on editorial boards of several scientific journals and as co-editor of Goodman and Gilman's Pharmacological Basis for Therapeutics.

About the lecture

"Signaling Specificity of G Protein-Coupled Receptors: The importance of location!"

"How binding of a neurotransmitter with a receptor transfers information to the molecular processes inside a cell which alter cellular function has been a major scientific advance. Dr. Lee Limbird has made substantial contributions to these advances through her studies on how the structure and molecular function of the alpha2-adrenergic receptor are coupled through G-proteins to affect multiple physiological functions of cells. She will discuss recent work on mechanisms by which alpha2-adrenergic receptors are delivered to, and retained in, specialized surface domains of the bilayer membrane of target cells. She has found that specific receptor sequences embedded in the membrane are critical to defining specifc locations within the membrane.

Determination of the membrane localization of the receptor will lead to an understanding as to how G-protein-coupled receptors interact specifically with "scaffolding" proteins to produce an integration of the neurotransmitter signal with multiple intracellular signaling pathways."

Quoted from the 2000 Loyd E. Harris Lecture Announcement Brochure.