Archive for the ‘Seminars’ Category

The Department of Biochemistry and the Evans Center in the Department of Medicine are sponsoring their second joint, thematic seminar series. The purpose of the series is to highlight a cutting edge topic in biology with disease relevance. The theme for the Spring joint seminar series is Stem Cells, Development, and Cancer. Each seminar will be held at 4:00 p.m. in Bakst Auditorium.

The first seminar to be held on Thursday, March 31 is a presentation by Mina Bissell, Ph.D., Distinguished Scientist, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory entitled The Microenvironment and the Genome in Breast Cancer: How Does Tissue Architecture Inform Therapy?

Dr. Carmela Abraham, Professor of Biochemistry, was awarded a $200,000 grant from the Alzheimer’s Association for her study entitled Modulators of APP Dimerization as Novel Therapeutics for Alzheimer’s Disease. The study uses an entirely innovative idea to prevent the formation of the toxic amyloid protein known to kill neurons and synapses in the brains of Alzheimer’s disease patients.

Dr. Abraham has been invited to speak at two conferences in March. In Barcelona, Spain, she will speak at the 10th International Congress on Alzheimer and Parkinson Disease on Klotho Enhancers as Novel Neuroprotective Therapeutics for Alzheimer’s Disease and White Matter Degeneration. In St. Louis, at the American Society for Neurochemistry, she will present on The Anti-Aging Protein Klotho Affects Oligodendrocyte Differentiation.

Spring series of seminars sponsored by the
Departments of Biochemistry and Medicine
begins on March 31

The Department of Biochemistry and the Evans Center in the Department of Medicine are sponsoring their second joint, thematic seminar series. The purpose of the series is to highlight a cutting edge topic in biology with disease relevance. The theme for the Spring joint seminar series is Stem Cells, Development, and Cancer. Each seminar will be held at 4:00 p.m. in Bakst Auditorium.

The first seminar to be held on Thursday, March 31 is a presentation by Mina Bissell, Ph.D., Distinguished Scientist, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory entitled The Microenvironment and the Genome in Breast Cancer: How Does Tissue Architecture Inform Therapy?

The second seminar in the series will be held on Thursday, April 7. The guest speaker will be Robert Weinberg, Ph.D. Professor of Biology, Whitehead Institute, MIT. The seminar is entitled High-grade Malignancy, the Epithelial-mesenchymal Transition, and Cancer Stem Cells.

The last in the series will be held on Thursday, April 28 and features Matthew Scott, Ph.D., Professor of Developmental Biology, genetics and Bioengineering, Stanford University and Investigator, Howard Hughes Medical institute. The title of this presentation is Communicating with Hedgehogs: Signaling in Development and Disease.

We have a poet in our midst; what a beautiful tribute to Dr. Matt Nugent’s
favorite molecules!

by Matthew A. Nugent

O Proteoglycans! My Proteoglycans!
our secret love you’ve won
With sugar sweet and such long chains,
on a column we often run.
Why must you hide your wonders from
those who grant the funding?
We question you with steady minds,
even as your story becomes daunting.
But O Glycan! Glycan! Glycan!
O the clotting you stop best.
Along your chains where sulfates lie,
precisely where is our great quest.

O Proteoglycans, my Proteoglycans,
rise up and show your purpose.
Rise up, for it is getting late, and we
are growing nervous.
For you those sugar chains and protein core,
for you the cells are crowding.
For you they say you’re too complex
their simple minds are closing.
Here PGs! Dear friends!
I realize now, only nature knows the truth.
It is time for you to show us now, before
we’ve gone and lost our youth.

O friend you do not answer,
your lips are quiet and still.
You glance and nod to show your brother,
HA the space he must fill.
All alone with no protein linked
to keep him warm and safe.
I wonder why we let him in our club,
for isn’t he a waif?
Ah no, he is a friend as well
with secrets of his own.
He guards these truths so fiercely now,
that never freely will he tell.
Ah my friends, as time goes by
there is just one thing I see
That you will be here longer still
beyond the time of me
That you will be here longer still
beyond all the time of we.

---

*Meter inspired by Walt Whitman’s O Captain! My Captain!

The Department of Biochemistry is pleased to announce the completion of the first phase of the K building renovation project which was initiated in the Spring of 2010. In addition to the new research laboratories, this phase of the project included the creation of a student lounge, conference rooms, updated equipment rooms, and new administrative offices.
A reception celebrating the completion of phase one of the K building renovation project was held on Wednesday, January 26, 2011. Dr. David Harris, Chair of Biochemistry, and the department thanked the many people who facilitated the successful completion of the first phase of the complex renovation project. At the reception the Department also welcomed two new faculty members, Dr. Bob Varelas and Dr. Valentina Perissi, whose laboratories will be in the newly renovated space on K6.”

The Department of Biochemistry is pleased to announce the appointment of Dr. Xaralabos (Bob) Varelas as a new Assistant Professor! Bob is a spectacular molecular and cell biologist from Jeff Wrana’s lab at the University of Toronto working on the Hippo pathway that controls cell size, and its connection with several other important signaling pathways. His work has implications for intercellular communication, development, and cancer, and will intersect with the research areas of a number of our faculty. Bob will start in January, 2011, and will occupy newly renovated laboratory space on the Harrison Avenue wing of K6. Please join us in welcoming Bob to the Department!

The Fourth Annual Biochemistry Student Research day organized by the Biochemistry Student Organization was held on September 30th, 2010 in the Hiebert Lounge. The event was a wonderful success, bringing the whole department together for an afternoon of science and camaraderie that began with a lovely lunch provided by the BSO, followed by research poster presentations from graduate students of all years within the department in a relaxed environment. This event is particularly useful for providing helpful suggestions and ideas to our students as well as acquainting new students within the department with the various exciting research that is being conducted by labs here in the Biochemistry department. Many thanks go out to everyone in attendance, the presenters and the organizers for helping to create another successful research day. We look forward to seeing everyone again next year! !

Drs. Emiliano Biasini and Ursula Unterberger receive honors at an international meeting on neurodegeneration.  Dr. Emiliano Biasini, an Instructor working in the laboratory of Dr. David Harris, was selected to give an oral presentation at the meeting “Prion 2010: From Agent to Disease”, which was held in Salzburg, Austria from September 8-11.  A poster presented by Dr. Ursula Unterberger, a postdoctoral fellow in Dr. Harris’ laboratory, was one of only five recognized by a special poster prize at the same meeting.  Other members of the Harris laboratory, including Dr. Tania Massignan (a postdoctoral fellow), Isaac Solomon (an M.D.-Ph.D. student), and Jessie Turnbaugh (a Ph.D. student) also presented posters at the meeting.  The meeting, which is held annually, is the major international venue for work on prion diseases, and attracts over 500 participants working on all aspects of these devastating neurodegenerative diseases.

Xiaojuan Li in Peter O’Connor Laboratory successfully defended her PhD thesis, “Mechanism of electron capture dissociation and the application to protein deamidation.”