Bioengineering Seminars

Join us for our next Bioengineering Department Seminar:

Wednesday, April 8
12noon – 1:00pm
177 Stanley Hall

“Revealing the Secrets of Metalloenzymes One Snapshot at a Time”

Dr. Catherine Drennan
John and Dorothy Wilson Professor of Biochemistry, MIT
Professor and Investigator, Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI)

Abstract:
How do microbes live on the pollutant carbon monoxide? How do microbes split the triple bond of nitrogen gas? When it comes to performing difficult chemistry, microbes often combine a protein scaffold with a highly reactive metallocofactor; they essentially employ a “hired gun.” The Drennan lab combines X-ray crystallography and cryo-electron microscopy with other biophysical methods to reveal the secrets behind metalloenzyme chemistry. In this seminar, Drennan will present her lab’s structural studies of ribonucleotide reductases (RNRs). RNRs use metallocofactors to generate radical species, enabling the conversion of ribonucleotides (the building blocks of RNA) to deoxyribonucleotides (the building blocks of DNA). These enzymes are chemotherapeutic targets and proposed antibacterial targets. Here, Drennan will describe how her lab has used biophysical methods to reveal RNRs’ secrets.

Join us for our next Bioengineering seminar:

Assessing Cardiac Function and Treatment Strategies from Development to the Pediatric Population

Stephanie Lindsey
UC San Diego

Wednesday, April 22
Noon – 1 p.m.
177 Stanley Hall

Abstract:
Congenital heart defects (CHDs) are among the most severe congenital abnormalities, accounting for over 29 percent of deaths from developmental abnormalities. Of these, approximately 25 percent require palliative surgery in the first year of life. While the precise origins of CHDs remain unknown, they arise from disturbances in cardiac morphogenesis, a complex interconnected process involving changing hemodynamic forces concomitant with cellular and molecular signaling. Despite advances in surgical and medical management, their potential to restore cardiac function remains compromised, largely due to continued complications from implanted devices. To that end, I explore innovative ways to advance treatment options for patients suffering from CHD, through the identification of new mechanistic insights into the origin of such defects and the optimization of current treatment options. To understand causation, I rely on the chick embryo as a mechanical model of development. Through the use of non-linear optics, I minimally invasively occlude flow inside the cardiac outflow tract and detail resulting structural and hemodynamic changes. I subsequently use numerical simulations to distinguish between the immediate effects of flow redistribution and longer-term compensation mechanisms. Towards optimization, I lay the groundwork for multiscale modeling of single ventricle physiology patients in the adult and pediatric populations and discuss implications on maternal-fetal health.

Join us for our next Bioengineering Spring 2026 Seminar:

Wednesday, April 29
Noon – 1:00pm
177 Stanley Hall

“MicroED solution to the lens MP20 enigma”

Dr. Tamir Gonen
Professor of Biological Chemistry and Physiology, David Geffen School of Medicine
University of California, Los Angeles

Abstract:
My laboratory studies the structures of membrane proteins that are important in maintaining cellular homeostasis. Understanding structure requires an atomic structural model of the protein of interest captured in various functional states. We developed the method Microcrystal Electron Diffraction (MicroED) and demonstrated that it is feasible to determine protein structures by electron diffraction using vanishingly small crystals. I will describe our efforts in the MicroED field and illustrate how this technique allows us to determine structures for novel proteins that were beyond the reach of other methods. I will use the small membrane protein MP20 from the eye lens as a case study and reveal an unexpected role for this protein as a tight junction protein.