Lance Miller, Ph.D., Research Assistant Professor of Pediatrics
Dr. Miller studies collecting duct salt and water transport as well as renal development. He investigates the regulation of amiloride-sensitive current by endothelin-1 in MPKccd14 and A6 cells using patch-clamp, open circuit analysis and immunoblotting. These experiments are to be extended to the isolated perfused collecting ducts from mice with the collecting duct-specific knockout of endothelin-1. Dr. Miller also collaborates with Dr. Raoul Nelson on the identification of collecting duct-specific transcription factors. He and Dr. Nelson developed transgenic mice which express GFP in either intercalated or principal cells. Using these mice, they have recently developed a technique for the automated isolation of large quantities of pure collecting duct for genomic, proteomic, functional analysis and establishing primary cell cultures. They are now developing a method to obtain pure intercalated and principal cells using fluorescence activated cell sorting and mice expressing DsRed fluorescent protein in principal cells and GFP in intercalated cells.
