Dr Ebru Aydar

Currently, I am a Senior lecturer in Pharmacology and Drugs of abuse at University of West London (0.4 FTE) at levels 4, 5 & 6.

Previously I was a senior lecturer in pharmacology and physiology at the University of East London. Moreover, I taught basic science to medical students at Imperial College London. I received my PGCE in 2010 and became a fellow of higher education academy.

I hold a BPharm degree (1st class honours with a Bronze medal) which was awarded in 1991. I received a NATO DPhil studentship in order to continue my studies at Oxford Brookes, UK where I received my DPhil in neuropharmacology in 1996. My main specialised research techniques were primary neuronal cultures from CNS and patch-clamp whole cell recording and cell attached recording /two electrode voltage-clamp recording electrophysiology. Subsequently, in 1996, I undertook post-doctoral research: a) in ion channel neurophysiology (voltage-gated ion channels) b) in cardiac ion channels (structure function relationships of cloned HERG channels -mutations of HERG channel causes life threatening cardiac arrhythmia LQ2 syndrome) c) in neuropharmacology of sigma receptors and ion channel interactions in the rat posterior pituitary neurophysial terminals, at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, Medical School Dept. of Physiology, USA. There, I studied basic molecular biological techniques (gene expression, transfection, gene cloning, basic mutagenesis, western blotting), confocal microscopy imaging, rat pituitary slice preparation and recordings, Xenopus laevis oocyte expression and mammalian expression systems and Xenopus oocyte electrophysiology (two electrode voltage-clamp and macro-patch) and patch-clamp single channel recording and analysis.

I passed a fruitful seven years at the University of Wisconsin Madison, WI, USA where I published in high impact factor journals such as Neuron. In, 2003 I wrote and received a Wellcome Trust Research Career Development fellowship for five years in order to study the function of sigma receptors in cancer cells and electrophysiology of HERG channels and their role in cardiac physiology. This project took place in Prof. Djamgoz’s lab at Imperial College, London. In these five years, I studied cancer cell biology such as cancer cell culture, cancer cell proliferation, cancer cell adhesion, gene silencing, confocal microscopy and patch clamping of cancer cells. During this period I published six research articles. I also hold a personal home office licence (Modules 1-5). In 2009, I took a Senior research fellowship at Prof. Yuri Koarchev’s lab at Imperial college, Hammersmith campus where I studied Scanning Ionic Conductance Microscopy (SICM) with this technique I was able to scan and perform whole cell patch clamp recordings from hippocampal neuronal cultures.  During my twenty- year research career, I have written several successful grants.

Current research

Modulation of ion channels by Sigma receptors

The so-called sigma receptor has been something of a mystery molecule for some time. First described as an opioid receptor, it was later found to interact with many types of drug and to affect the cardiac, nervous, endocrine and immune systems as well as playing a role in cancer metastasis. One example of sigma receptor function is its ability to mediate the modulatory effects of psychotropic compounds on some ion channels. As sigma receptors bind antipsychotic drugs, understanding their mechanism of action might have practical implications. At the same time, channel regulation by protein-protein interactions deserves further attention, as it adds degrees of freedom to the way in which ion channels govern neuronal function.

Systems biology of cation transport

Cationic toxicity is involved in a substantial number of biological phenomena, such as salt stress in crops and many human diseases. The yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae is a versatile model system with a myriad of biotechnological applications.  In yeast, maintenance of cation homeostasis is an essential process that affects parameters such as membrane potential, intracellular pH, cell volume and that directly influences nutrient uptake and growth.  We are currently studying the electrophysiological properties of a number of yeast ion channels in order to provide more comprehensive data for modeling cation transport in yeast.

Recent collaborations

Novel peptide inhibitors of T-type channels in neuronal cells with Prof Chris Palmer at London Metropolitan University

Systems biology of cation transport in yeast in collaboration with TRANSLUCENT-2. TRANSLUCENT-2 is composed of six partners plus an associate partner, assembling a powerful team of 9 independent laboratories.

Joaquin Ariño, Autonomous University of Barcelona

EddaKlipp, Humboldt-Universitätzu Berlin

Jost Ludwig, University of Bonn

MaikKschischo, University of Koblenz

José Ramos, University of Cordoba

Paul van Heusden, University of Leiden,

Christopher Palmer and Ebru Aydar, London Metropolitan University

See Dr Ebru Aydar's publications list in the UWL Repository.