By Irene Hsiao
Women in Chemistry welcomes MIT Professor Cathy L. Drennan to the University of Chicago for the 2019 Women in Chemistry seminar this Friday, February 8, from 1:45 to 2:45 in Kent 120. Specializing in the use of X-ray crystallography and electron microscopy to study the mechanisms of metalloproteins and metalloenzymes, Drennan will deliver a seminar titled, “Shake, Rattle, & Roll: Capturing Snapshots of Metalloproteins in Action,” in which she considers the conformational gymnastics of ribonucleotide reductases, metalloenzymes that convert ribonucleotides to deoxyribonucleotides for DNA biosynthesis and repair (see abstract below).Following her graduate studies in biological chemistry at the University of Michigan and postdoctoral research at Caltech, Drennan joined the faculty of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where she is professor of chemistry and biology. A passionate educator, Drennan was named a Howard Hughes Medical Institute professor for excellent teaching and mentoring in 2006, and in 2008 became the first HHMI professor to be appointed an HHMI investigator. She has also been honored as an Alfred P. Sloan Fellow, a MacVicar Fellow, a Herschbach teacher/scientist at Harvard University, a King Lecturer at Northeastern University, the Kenneth L. Rinehart Lecturer at UIUC, and the William W. Wells Lecturer at Michigan State University. Drennan is the recipient of several awards, including the Everett Moore Baker Memorial Award for Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching, the Harold E. Edgerton Faculty Achievement Award, Dean’s Educational and Student Advising Award, the ASBMB–Schering–Plough Research Institute Scientific Achievement Award, and the Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers.
Drennan’s talk will be the third annual UChicago WiC seminar since WiC was established as a recognized student organization in 2016. Founded by Judith Kamm (PhD 2017) and Mary Andorfer (PhD 2017) and currently led by graduate students Sarah Brown, Julia Murphy, Tessa Lynch-Colameta, and Nanetta Pon, WiC aims to create a community and support network for female and female-identifying graduate students and postdocs in the Department of Chemistry by offering mentoring relationships among its members and opportunities for safe and positive exchange. The WiC seminar honors an excellent researcher who has also actively supported women in science. Past WiC seminar speakers have been Audrey Moores, professor of chemistry at McGill University, and Francesca Serra, professor of physics and astronomy at Johns Hopkins University. WiC co-founder Andorfer, now a postdoc in Drennan’s lab, says, “Drennan cares deeply about diversity of all kinds within the sciences and has many amazing resources that can be shared with the broader UChicago community.”
Shake, Rattle, & Roll: Capturing Snapshots of Metalloproteins in Action
Cathy L. Drennan Howard Hughes Medical Institute and Departments of Biology and Chemistry, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Friday, February 8, 2019, Kent 120, 1:45-2:45
ABSTRACT
Metalloproteins, or proteins that utilize metals to perform their functions, are responsible for a wide range of activities such as the conversion of greenhouse gas carbon dioxide into cellular biomass. To carry out their functions, these proteins often need to be flexible and assume different conformational states, with units of the protein swinging back and forth to enable reactants to bind the protein or products to leave. In this talk, the conformational gymnastics involved in ribonucleotide reduction are considered. Ribonucleotide reductases (RNRs) are metalloenzymes that convert ribonucleotides (the building blocks of RNA) to deoxyribonucleotides (the building blocks of DNA). RNRs are targets for cancer chemotherapies and have been proposed to be candidates for antimicrobial therapies. In this talk, I will describe how my lab has employed biophysical methods to interrogate how RNRs shake, rattle, and roll to accomplish their critical cellular function.