Aaron M. Robitaille
Mass spectrometry scientist who, as a PhD student in Michael Hall's lab, used phosphoproteomics to show that mTORC1 switches on the cell's production of pyrimidines, and who now works on proteomics applications at Thermo Fisher Scientific
Senior Product Applications Specialist, Thermo Fisher Scientific, San Jose · postdoc, Randall Moon lab, University of Washington, Seattle · PhD, Michael N. Hall lab, Biozentrum, University of Basel
Portrait: LCGC International (Thermo Fisher Scientific headshot)
To grow and divide, a cell must copy its DNA and make lots of RNA, and both need pyrimidines, a family of chemical building blocks. Aaron Robitaille was first author of the 2013 Science paper in this Atlas (ROB2013), from Michael Hall's lab in Basel. Using quantitative phosphoproteomics, a mass spectrometry method that measures thousands of phosphorylation sites at once, the team found 335 proteins whose phosphorylation depended on mTOR. One of them was CAD, the enzyme that runs the first three steps of making pyrimidines. mTORC1, the growth-control complex, switches CAD on through S6 kinase. The work, done in cultured cells, tied the main growth signal directly to the supply of DNA and RNA building blocks.
Robitaille did the PhD at the University of Basel in Michael Hall's laboratory and then moved to the University of Washington in Seattle as a postdoc in Randall Moon's lab, using quantitative proteomics to measure protein levels and protein partners and to find regulators of embryonic stem cell differentiation. The thread through this work is the use of mass spectrometry to follow how cells respond to their surroundings when they decide to grow or change identity.
Robitaille now works at Thermo Fisher Scientific in San Jose, California, as a Senior Product Applications Specialist for mass spectrometry and proteomics.
Milestones in the Atlas
A selection, not a full bibliography: only papers that meet the Atlas inclusion criteria.
| Year | Evidence | Study |
|---|---|---|
| 2013 | M | Quantitative phosphoproteomics reveal mTORC1 activates de novo pyrimidine synthesis ROB2013 First author: used quantitative phosphoproteomics to show that mTORC1 activates pyrimidine synthesis through S6 kinase and CAD. |
Co-authors in the Atlas 3
People with a profile here who share at least one study with Aaron M. Robitaille.
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- Marion Cornu Physiologist from Michael Hall's Basel lab who showed in mice that mTORC1 in the liver controls body temperature, movement and fat metabolism through the hormone FGF21
- Michael N. Hall Discovered TOR in yeast in 1991 and established it as a central controller of cell growth that responds to nutrients. His lab later showed that TOR works in two distinct complexes, TORC1 and TORC2, only one of which is blocked by rapamycin
- Mitsugu Shimobayashi Metabolism researcher who trained with Michael Hall in Basel on mTOR in fat tissue and now leads a group at KU Leuven studying how fat and liver control sugar and lipid storage
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