December 2013 News
Mark Richter (professor), in collaboration with Pinnacle Technology, Inc. of Lawrence, is the recipient of a Small Business Technology Transfer Award from the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) for the proposal entitled: "Applications and Methods for Continuous Monitoring of Physiological Chemistry." The goal of this project is to develop a platform methodology to screen, clone, evolve and stabilize oxidase enzymes for the measurement of metabolic biomarkers via biosensors.
Through the Provost's Strategic Initiative Grant Program at KU, a Level I proposal was funded to develop a multi-disciplinary Center for Anti-Infective Discovery and Development. The Center will be headed by a leadership team consisting of Susan Egan (Professor, Molecular Biosciences); Scott Hefty (Associate Professor, Molecular Biosciences); Jeff Aubé (University Distinguished Professor, Medicinal Chemistry); Berl Oakley (Irving S. Johnson Distinguished Professor of Molecular Biology, Molecular Biosciences); Mario Rivera (Professor; Chemistry) and Michael Parmely (Professor and Chair, KUMC, Microbiology, Molecular Genetics, and Immunology). Two major initiatives of this center are to fund six preliminary high throughput screens against infectious disease targets and to support monthly meetings to bring together individuals from across KU with interests in anti-infective discovery and development. The grant will also provide funds toward the outfitting of an ITV room in Haworth that will enable real-time video conferencing with remote sites.
Kristi Neufeld and Liang Xu (associate professors) received an award from the KU Cancer Center as participants in a Program Project Development Proposal entitled “RNA Binding Proteins in Colorectal Cancers”. The research team, led by Shrikant Anant from the KU Medical Center, includes three investigators working directly on RNA binding proteins and colorectal cancer, two with expertise in developing compounds that target RNA-protein interactions, and one with extensive experience in drug discovery.
Eric Deeds (assistant professor) and Audrey Lamb (associate professor) served as mentors and poster judges at the Annual Biomedical Research Conference for Minority Students at the Opryland Hotel in Nashville, Tennessee, November 13-16. Several MB undergrads were delegates at the conference and presented their research as posters: Christopher Trezza (Buechner lab), Simon Kelow (Karanicolas lab), Serena Senegal (Xu lab), and Alexander Fondaw (Karanicolas lab).
Alexandria Roy (undergraduate, Xu lab) won a poster presentation award in the undergraduate molecular bioscience division at the annual meeting of the Society for the Advancement of Hispanics/Chicanos and Native Americans in Science in San Antonio, October 15-19.
Brad Hutchison (undergraduate, Lamb lab) is the recipient of the Paul A. Kitos Award for Excellence in Undergraduate Biochemical Research.
