The lab rotations in the first year and the major research project for years 2-4 will be carried out in the research groups of the following 11 principal investigators (PIs). Some recent publications of the PIs are given below. Links to the individual websites of the PIs can be made by selecting the names below.
School of Biology: Profs Richard Elliott, Richard Randall, Martin Ryan,
Profs Garry Taylor, Malcolm White, Dr Rupert Russell
School of Chemistry: Prof James Naismith, Dr Nicholas Westwood,
School of Medicine: Dr Catherine Adamson, Dr Joanna Parish
Professor Richard Elliott FRSE (Professor of Virology) Emerging viruses and host response to viral infection
Léonard, V. H. J., Kohl, A., Hart, T.J. and Elliott, R.M. (2006) Interaction of Bunyamwera orthobunyavirus NSs protein with the Mediator protein MED8: a mechanism for inhibiting the interferon response. Journal of Virology 80, 9667-9675.
Blakqori, G., van Knippenberg, I. and Elliott, R.M. (2009) Bunyamwera orthobunyavirus S segment untranslated regions mediate poly(A) tail-independent translation. Journal of Virology 83, 3637-3646.
Eifan, S.A. and Elliott, R.M. (2009) Mutational analysis of the Bunyamwera orthobunyavirus nucleocapsid protein gene. Journal of Virology, in press.
Professor Richard Randall (Professor of Molecular Virology) Vaccines and host repsonse to viral infection
Hale, B., Jackson, D., Chen, Y-H., Lamb, R.A. and Randall, R.E. (2006) Influenza A virus NS1 protein binds p85- and activates phosphatidylinositol-3-kinase signaling. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 103, 14194-14199.
Andrejeva, J., K.S.Childs, D.F.Young, T.S. Carlos, N. Stock, S. Goodbourn, & R.E. Randall (2004) The V proteins of paramyxoviruses bind the IFN-inducible RNA helicase, mda-5 and inhibit its activation of the IFN- promoter. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 101, 17264-17269.
Precious, B., Childs, K., Fitzpatrick-Swallow, V., Goodbourn, S., and Randall, R.E. (2005) SV5 V protein acts as an adaptor, linking DDB1 to STAT2, to facilitate the ubiquitination of STAT1. Journal of Virology 79, 13434-13441.
Dr Rupert Russell (Lecturer) Structural biology of virus-host interactions and drug discovery
Russell, R.J., Kerry, P.S., Stevens, D.J., Steinhauer, D.A., Martin, S.R., Gamblin, S.J. and Skehel, J.J. (2008) Structure of Influenza Haemagglutinin in complex with an inhibitor of membrane fusion. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 105, 17736-17741.
Russell,R.J., Haire, L.F., Stevens, D.J., Collins, P.J., Lin, Y.P., Blackburn, G.M., Hay, A.J., Gamblin, S.J. and Skehel, J.J. (2006) The structure of H5N1 avian influenza neuraminidase suggests new opportunities for drug design. Nature 443(7107), 45-49; Full text via DOI.
Gamblin, S.J., Haire, L.F., Russell, R.J., Stevens, D.J., Xiao, B., Ha, Y., Vasisht, N., Steinhauer, D.A., Daniels, R.S., Elliot, A., Wiley, D.C. and Skehel, J.J. (2004) The structure and receptor binding properties of the 1918 Influenza Hemagglutinin. Science 303(5665),1838-1842.
Professor Martin Ryan (Professor of Translational Virology) Picornaviruses and biotechnological applications of viral mechanisms
Doronina, V.A., Wu, C., de Felipe, P., Sachs, M.S., Ryan, M.D. and Brown, J.D. (2008) Site-specific release of nascent chains from ribosomes at a sense codon. Molecular and Cell Biology 28, 4227- 4239.
de Felipe, P and Ryan, M.D. (2004) Targeting of proteins derived from self-processing polyproteins containing multiple signal sequences. Traffic 5, 616-626.
Donnelly, M.L.L., Luke, G., Mehrotra, A., Li, X., Hughes, L.E., Gani, D. and Ryan, M.D. (2001) Analysis of the aphthovirus 2A/2B polyprotein ‘cleavage’ mechanism indicates not a proteolytic reaction, but a novel translational effect: a putative ribosomal ‘skip’. Journal of General Virology 82, 1013-1025.
Professor Garry Taylor FRSE (Professor of Molecular Biophysics) Structural biology of virus-host interactions and drug discovery
Crennell, S.J., Takimoto, T., Portner, A. and Taylor, G. (2000) The crystal structure of the multifunctional hemagglutinin-neuraminidase. Nature Structural Biology 7, 1068-1074.
Alymova, I.V., Taylor, G., Takimoto, T., Lin, T-S., Chand, P., Babu, Y.S., Li, C., Xiong, X. and Portner, A. (2004) Efficacy of novel hemagglutinin-neuraminidase inhibitors BCX 2798 and BCX 2855 against human parainfluenza viruses in vitro and in vivo. Antimicrobial Agents and Chemotherapy 48, 1495-1502.
Potter, J., Randall, R.E. and Taylor, G.L. (2008) Crystal structure of human IPS-1/MAVS/VISA/Cardif caspase activation recruitment domain. BMC Structural Biology 8, 11.
Professor Malcolm White FRSE (Professor of Biology) The CRISPR system - a bacterial immune system against virus infection
Liu, H., Rudolf, J., Johnson, K.A., McMahon, S.A., Oke, M., Carter, L., McRobbie, A-M., Brown, S.E., Naismith, J.H. and White, M.F. (2008) Structure of the DNA repair helicase XPD. Cell 133, 801-812.
Richard, D.J., Bolderson, E., Cubeddu, L., Wadsworth, R.I.M., Savage, K., Sharma, G.G., Nicolette, M.L., Tsvetanov, S., McIlwraith, M.J., Pandita, R.K., Takeda, S., Hay, R.T., Gautier, J., Paull, T.T., Pandita, T.K., White, M.F. and Khanna, K.K. (2008) Single-stranded DNA-binding protein hSSB1 is critical for genomic stability. Nature 453, 677-682.
Rudolf, J., Makrantoni, V., Ingledew, W.J., Stark, M.J.R. and White, M.F. (2006) The DNA repair helicases XPD and FancJ have essential iron-sulfur domains. Molecular Cell 23, 801-808.
Professor James Naismith FRSE (Director of BSRC, Professor of Chemical Biology) Structural biology of viral components and drug discovery
Dong, C., Beis, K., Nesper, J., Brunkan, A.L., Clarke, B.R., Whitfield, C. and Naismith, J.H. (2006) Wza the translocon for E. coli capsular polysaccharides is a new class of membrane protein. Nature 444, 226-229.
Wang, W., Black, S.S., Edwards, M.D., Miller, S., Morrison, E.L., Bartlett, W., Dong, C., Naismith, J.H. and Booth, I.R. (2008) The structure of an open form of an E. coli mechanosensitive channel at 3.45 Å resolution. Science 321, 1179-1184.
Schmelz, S., Kadi, N., McMahon, S.A., Song, L., Oves-Costales, D., Oke, M., Liu, H., Johnson, K.A., Carter, L.G., White, M.F., Challis, G.L. and Naismith, J.H. (2009) Structure and function of AcsD a new class of adenylating enzyme that catalyzes citrate desymmetrization in pathogenicity-conferring siderophore biosynthesis. Nature Chemical Biology 5, 174-82.
Dr Nicolas Westwood (Reader in Chemistry) Synthetic chemistry of antivrial drugs
Medda, F., Russell, R.J.M., Higgins, M., McCarthy, A.R., Campbell, J., Slawin, A.M.Z., Lane, D.P., Lain, S. and Westwood, N.J. (2009) Novel Cambinol Analogs as Sirtuin Inhibitors: Synthesis, Biological Evaluation, and Rationalization of Activity. Journal of Medicinal Chemistry 52(9), 2673-2682.
Lain, S., Hollick, J.J., Campbell, J., Staples, O.D., Higgins, M., Aoubala, M., McCarthy, A., Appleyard, V., Murray, K.E., Baker, L., Thompson, A., Mathers, J., Holland, S.J., Stark, M.J.R., Pass, G., Woods, J., Lane, D.P. and Westwood, N.J. (2008) Discovery, in vivo activity, and mechanism of action of a small-molecule p53 activator. Cancer Cell 13(5), 454-463.
Lucas-Lopez, C., Allingham, J.S., Lebl, T., Lawson, C.P.A.T., Brenk, R., Sellers, J.R., Rayment, I. and Westwood, N.J.. (2008) The small molecule tool (S)-(-)-blebbistatin: novel insights of relevance to myosin inhibitor design. Organic and Biomolecular Chemistry 6(12), 2076-2084.
Dr Catherine Adamson (Lecturer in Molecular Medicine) HIV virus and drug resistance
Adamson, C.S., Waki, K., Ablan, S., Salzwedel, K. and Freed, E.O. (2009) Impact of human immunodeficiency virus type 1 resistance to protease inhibitors on evolution of resistance to the maturation inhibitor bevirimat (PA-457). Journal of Virology 83, 4884-94.
Adamson, C.S., Ablan, S., Boeras, I., Goila-Gaur, R., Soheilian, F., Nagashima, K., Li, F., Salzwedel, K., Sakalian, M., Wild, C.T. and Freed, E.O. (2006) In vitro resistance to the human immunodeficiency virus type 1 maturation inhibitor PA-457 (Bevirimat). Journal of Virology 80, 10957-10971.
Adamson, C.S., Nermut, M. and Jones, I.M. (2003) Control of human immunodeficiency virus type 1 protease activity in insect cells expressing Gag-Pol rescues assembly of immature but not mature virus-like particles. Virology 308, 157-165.
Dr Joanna Parish (Royal Society URF and Lecturer in Medicine) Host-virus interactions in human papillomaviruses
Parish, J.L., Bean, A.M., Park, R.B. and Androphy, E.J. (2006) ChlR1 Is Required for Loading Papillomavirus E2 onto Mitotic Chromosomes and Viral Genome Maintenance. Molecular Cell 24, 867–876.
Parish, J.L., Rosa. J,, Wang, X., Lahti, J.M., Doxsey, S.J., and Androphy, E.J. (2006) The DNA helicase ChlR1 is required for sister chromatid cohesion in mammalian cells. Journal of Cell Science 1, 4857-4865.
Parish, J.L., Kowalczyk, A., Chen, H-T., Roeder, G.E., Sessions, R., Buckie, M. and Gaston, K. (2006) E2 Proteins from High- and Low-Risk Human Papillomavirus Types Differ in Their Ability To Bind p53 and Induce Apoptotic Cell Death. Journal of Virology 80, 4580–4590.
Dr Chang-Jiang Dong (Wellcome Trust Career Development Fellow) Lassa fever proteins
Qi X, Lan S, Wang W, Schelde LM, Dong H, Wallat GD, Ly H, Liang Y, Dong C.(2010) Cap binding and immune
evasion revealed by Lassa nucleoprotein structure. Nature. 2010 Nov 17. [Epub ahead of print]
Dong C, Beis K, Nesper J, Brunkan-Lamontagne AL, Clarke BR, Whitfield C, Naismith JH.(2006) Wza the
translocation for E.coli capsular polysaccharides defines a new class of membrane protein.
Nature 444(7116):226-9. Epub 2006 Nov 1.
Dong C, Huang F, Deng H, Schaffrath C, Spencer JB, O'Hagan D, Naismith JH.(2004). Crystal structure and
mechanism of a bacterial fluorinating enzyme. Nature. 427(6974):561-5.