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Research Faculty—Biochemistry and Molecular Biology

Program Director/Department Chair: Patricia Kane, PhD

  • David Amberg, PhD
    Professor
    Research Interests:

    Regulation of actin dynamics and analysis of genomic influences on actin function.

  • Alaji Bah, PhD
    Assistant Professor
    Research Interests:

    Elucidate the structure, dynamics and functions of intrinsically disordered proteins and protein regions (IDPs/IDRs) and their biological regulation by Post-translational modifications.

  • Audrey Bernstein, PhD
    Professor
    Research Interests:

    Fibrosis; Scarring; Protein degradation; ubiquitin; integrins; cytoskeleton; patient-derived model systems

  • Dimitra Bourboulia, PhD
    Associate Professor
    Research Interests:

    • Extracellular kinase signaling
    • Extracellular chaperone function 
    • Targeting extracellular signaling networks in urological cancers

  • Peter Calvert, PhD
    Professor
    Research Interests:

    Molecular mechanisms of protein transport and localization in retinal neurons; mechanisms of retinal degenerative diseases

  • Xin Jie Chen, PhD
    Distinguished Professor
    Research Interests:

    Mitochondrial biology, stress signaling and aging-related degenerative diseases.

  • Michael Cosgrove, PhD
    Professor
    Research Interests:

    Epigenetic regulation of chromatin, Mixed Lineage Leukemia, Structural Biology, Enzymology, Biophysical Chemistry, Rational drug design

  • Thomas Duncan, PhD
    Associate Professor
    Research Interests:

    F-type ATP synthases; bioenergetics of pathogenic bacteria; enzymology; structural biology, membrane protein function.

  • Wenyi Feng, PhD
    Associate Professor
    Research Interests:

    Chromosomal DNA replication origins (location, timing and regulation), replication fork integrity and checkpoint regulation, genomic instability and chromosome fragility in both the yeast and human genome

  • Diana Gilligan, MD/PhD
    Associate Professor
    Research Interests:

    My research includes studies of the role of microRNA in development of leukemia.

  • Steven Hanes, PhD
    Emeritus
    Research Interests:

    Gene expression in development and disease, RNA pol II regulation, homeobox genes, prolyl isomerases

  • Patricia Kane, PhD
    Distinguished Teaching Professor
    Research Interests:

    Vacuolar H+ATPases (structure, function, assembly and regulation), cellular pH homeostasis, cellular stress responses, protein sorting, genomics, yeast as a model system

  • William Kerr, PhD
    Professor
    Research Interests:

    My research is primarily focused on defining the role of SHIP1 in immunity, obesity, stem cell biology and cancer. This research has revealed that SHIP1 is at the nexus of signaling pathways that regulate: (1) hematopoietic and mesenchymal stem cell homeostasis, (2) terminal differentiation of myeloid cells, (3) acute BM graft rejection, (4) survival of T cells in the small intestine and (5) survival of hematologic cancer cells. More recently we developed SHIP1 and pan-SHIP1/2 inhibitors and showed they can expand stem cells in vivo, reverse obesity, eradicate certain cancers and boost tumor immunity. We are also attempting to better understand what LRBA does in immune cells. LRBA is a scaffold protein that coordinates intracellular vesicle trafficking with receptor signaling.

  • Barry Knox, PhD
    Professor
    Research Interests:

    Visual transduction, Gene Expression, Membrane proteins

  • Bruce Knutson, PhD
    Associate Professor
    Research Interests:

    RNA polymerase I transcription (structure, assembly, regulation), nucleolar biology, macromolecular architecture, crosslinking, proteomics, bioinformatics, modeling, molecular genetics, biochemistry, model systems

  • Leszek Kotula, MD/PhD
    Associate Professor
    Research Interests:

    Cancer biology, cell signaling, the role of actin cytoskeleton in tumor progression, mouse models of cancer

  • Vladimir Kuznetsov, PhD
    Professor
    Research Interests:

    Cancer systems biology, bioinformatics, big data and survival prediction analyses, predictive and personalized medicine, computational genome and transcriptome biology, non-B DNA structures, RNA:DNA hybrids, R-loops, G-quadruplexes, ncRNAs, clinical biomarker discovery and validation

  • Stewart Loh, PhD
    Professor
    Research Interests:

    Protein engineering, design, and folding

  • Frank Middleton, PhD
    Professor
    Research Interests:

    • Genetic, epigenetic, and neuroanatomical basis of neurological and psychiatric disorders
    • Basal ganglia and cerebellar circuitry in normal and disease states
    • Neural-immune and gut-brain interactions
    • Machine learning approaches for biomarker discovery
    • Next generation sequencing for multiomic data analysis (genome, transcriptome, microbiome, methylome) 

  • Mehdi Mollapour, PhD
    Professor
    Research Interests:

    Role of molecular chaperone Hsp90 in cancers

    Kidney Cancer, Bladder Cancer, Breast Cancer

    Tuberous Sclerosis Complex syndrome (TSC)

    Birt-Hogg-Dubé syndrome (BHD)

     

  • Andras Perl, MD, PhD
    Distinguished Professor
    Research Interests:

    Genes and Viruses Predisposing to Autoimmunity, Genetics, Apoptosis, Endogenous Retroviruses, Transaldolase

  • Francesca Pignoni, PhD
    Professor and Chair
    Research Interests:

    Neurogenesis; Retinal Progenitor Cells Specification and Proliferation; Genetic Control of Stem Cell Identity and Maintenance; Disease Genes Analysis in Drosophila

  • David Pruyne, PhD
    Associate Professor
    Research Interests:

    Understanding how muscle cells organize their actin cytoskeleton into efficient contractile units, using a combination of in vitro biochemistry, and analysis of cultured muscle cells and genetic models C. elegans and zebrafish.

  • Jessica Ridilla, PhD
    Associate Professor
    Research Interests:

    • Regulation of actin filament polymerization
    • Mechanisms of actin-microtubule crosstalk
    • Role of actin and microtubules in neurodegenerative diseases, particularly amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS).
    • Single-molecule super-resolution microscopy techniques (i.e. TIRF, STED, STORM).
     

  • Mark Schmitt, PhD
    Professor
    Research Interests:

    Ribonucleoprotein assembly and biogenesis; mitochondrial RNA import, mRNA degradation, cell cycle control

  • Andrea Viczian, PhD
    Associate Professor
    Research Interests:

    Mammalian retinal stem cells formation; molecular mechanism of retinal cell fate decisions; vascular development in the CNS; using cell replacement therapy to heal the blinded eye.

  • Stephan Wilkens, PhD
    Associate Professor
    Research Interests:

    Structure and Mechanism of Membrane Bound Transport Proteins

  • Michael Zuber, PhD
    Associate Professor
    Research Interests:

    The molecular basis of retinal stem cell formation; regulating retinal stem/progenitor cell proliferation; using retinal stem/progenitor cells to heal the injured or degenerating retina.

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