Biochemical Mechanisms in Medicine - Research

Research within the Biochemical Mechanisms in Medicine (BMM) discipline is distinguished by its focus on understanding the underlying mechanisms of biological processes. Approaches to these problems used in the research programs of discipline faculty range from the cellular level; dissecting out signaling pathways and modes of action of specific enzymes and macromolecular machines in the cell, to the atomic level; resolving the structural details of macromolecules and their complexes. It is this understanding of molecular mechanisms that has been central to the modern revolution in drug discovery, where small molecules can be individually tailored to their specific targets. To facilitate these mechanistic discoveries, the Department of Biochemistry and Structural Biology has invested heavily in core facilities that provide a wide array of state-of-the-art technologies including:

• Biomolecular NMR Core
• X-ray Crystallography Core Laboratory
• Center for Macromolecular Interactions
• Mass Spectrometry Laboratory
• High Throughput/Content Screening Facility and Medicinal Chemistry

Because of the basic mechanistic approaches utilized within the BMM, discipline, labs work on research of relevance to many organ systems and diseases, particularly with respect to the development of new therapeutics. For example:

• Cancer: Ivanov, Libich, Gupta, Shiio, Sung, Jiang, Nicholson
• Neuroscience/Aging: Lafer, Fitzpatrick, Jiang, Sousa, Shapiro, Brenner, Stockand, Musi
• Infectious Disease: LoVerde, Ivanov, Lafer, Serwer

In addition, several different basic biological processes are investigated by our laboratories

• DNA/Protein Interactions: Sung, Ivanov, Gupta, Sousa
• Protein folding/assembly: Libich, Sousa, Lafer
• Cell communication/signaling: Jiang, Nicholson, Shiio, Brenner, Shapiro
• Viral assembly: Ivanov, Serwer
• Parasitology: LoVerde