Science

Malaria: Cooperating antibodies enhance immune response

20 June 2018|

Source: Steve Bryson, PhD

Malaria is one of the most inflicting infectious diseases worldwide. Each year, an estimated 200 million people contract malaria and approximately 440,000 people succumb to the infectious disease.

Scientists in the Julien lab at The Hospital for Sick Children (SickKids) and their collaborators at the German Cancer Research Center (DKFZ) in Heidelberg, Germany, have studied how the human immune system combats malaria infections. In this […]

Researchers revisit the role of conformational dynamics and the protein ensemble in catalysis

21 February 2017|

Researchers in Prosser Lab and Pai Lab recently published in Science on the Role of Dimer Asymmetry and Protomer Dynamics in Enzyme Catalysis.

The associated YouTube video can be viewed here.

 

An artistic interpretation of the enzyme fluoroacetate dehalogenase binding substrate (green) in the left subunit and releasing bound water molecules (red) in the right-hand subunit.

The roles of protein dynamics and water networks in catalysis visualized

1 February 2017|

The dimeric enzyme fluoroacetate dehalogenase is one of only a handful of protein catalysts that can break the strongest bond in organic chemistry, the one between carbon and fluorine atoms, in the process transforming the highly toxic pesticide fluoroacetate into glycolate, a benign molecule.  The laboratories of Emil Pai and Scott Prosser, together with the group of Régis Pomès and collaborators in the US and Japan, have […]

Advanced protein engineering produces a candidate HIV vaccine prime immunogen - J Jardine C Corbaci

Banting Fellow in Julien lab contributes structure of immune hook that sets paradigm for HIV-1 vaccine testing in humans

24 March 2016|

A CIHR Banting Fellow in the Julien laboratory at the SickKids Research Institute, June Ereño-Orbea solved the crystal structure of an engineered HIV-1 immunogen, which brings the field one step closer to inducing broadly neutralizing antibodies (bnAbs) as a major HIV vaccine goal. This study, led by Bill Schief at The Scripps Research Institute and published in Science resolves a critical unmet challenge: to design a molecule that […]