Assistant Professor
Systems Biology and Translational Medicine
Assistant Professor
Biomedical Engineering, Texas A&M University

349A Reynolds Medical Building
College Station, Texas 77843-1114
Phone: 979-845-7990
Fax: 979-862-4638
Email: trache@tamu.edu

Education

1985-1989, B.S., Physics, University of Bucharest

1993-1996, Ph.D., Physics, Institute of Atomic Physics, Romania

Trache Lab

Research Interests:

Experimental Biophysics

My research focuses on the application of advances in physics/optics to the study of biological phenomena at the cellular level. I am interested in developing technologies with unique capabilities that are broadly applicable across biological problems.

The research in my laboratory has a multidisciplinary approach, being directed towards studying the cellular responses to mechano-chemical stresses at the level of vascular cells: endothelial and smooth muscle cells. Transmission of force is a classical physical concept applied to live cell dynamics, intracellular protein translocation, and transduction of mechanical signals along intracellular pathways. We are interested in studying the molecular mechanisms responsible for altering the intracellular force balance and the effect of mechanotransduction on the reorganization of distant cell-cell and cell-matrix adhesion sites.

Selected Publications

Andreea Trache and G. A. Meininger ‘Total Internal Reflection Fluorescence Microscopy’ in Current Protocols in Microbiology, R. Coico, T. Kowalik, J.M. Quarles, B. Stevenson and R.K. Taylor eds., Wiley & Sons Inc., (submitted 2008)

S Na, Andreea Trache, Z. Sun, G.A. Meininger, J.D. Humphrey. "Time-dependent changes in cell stiffness and focal adhesion area in response to cyclic stretch" Annals Biomed. Eng. 36 (2008) 369-380.

Andreea Trache and G. A. Meininger ‘Atomic Force Microscopy’ in Current Protocols in Microbiology, R. Coico, T. Kowalik, J.M. Quarles, B. Stevenson and R.K. Taylor eds., Wiley & Sons Inc., 2C (2008) 2.1-17

MH. Chowdhury, VA Gant, Andreea Trache, A Baldwin, G. A. Meininger and GL Cote. “The use of surface enhanced Raman spectroscopy (SERS) for the detection of human integrins”, Journal of Biomedical Optics 11, 024004 (2006) (8 pages).

DM Hawkins,Andreea Trache, AE Ellis, D Stevenson, A Holzenburg, GA Meininger, and SM Reddy. “Quantification and confocal imaging of fluorescently labelled protein specific molecularly imprinted polymers (HydroMIPs)”, Biomacromolecules vol 7 (2006) pp. 2560-2564.

L.A. Martinez-Lemus, Z. Sun, Andreea Trache, J.P. Trzeciakowski, G.A. Meininger “Integrins and regulation of the Microcirculation: From arterioles to molecular studies using Atomic Force Microscopy”, Microcirculation vol 12 (2005) pp. 99-112

Andreea Trache, J.P. Trzeciakowski, L.A. Gardiner, Z. Sun, M. Muthuchamy , M. Guo, S. Yuan, GA Meininger. “Histamine effect on endothelial cell fibronectin interaction studied by atomic force microscopy”, Biophysical Journal vol.89 (2005) pp. 2888-2898

Andreea Trache and G.A Meininger. “An Atomic Force – Multi Optical Imaging Integrated Microscope for Monitoring Molecular Dynamics in Live Cells”, Journal of Biomedical Optics 10, 064023 (2005) (17 pages).

Z. Sun, L.A. Martinez-Lemus, Andreea Trache, J.P. Trzeciakowski, G.E. Davis, U. Pohl, G.A. Meininger “Mechanical Properties of the Interaction between Fibronectin and a5b1 Integrin on Vascular Smooth Muscle Cells: Studied using Atomic Force Microscopy”, Am J Physiol: Heart Circ Physiol. vol 289 (2005) pp. H2526-2535.