Kuriyan Lab: Graduate Student Research
University of California, Berkeley
Department of Molecular and Cell Biology
Department of Chemistry
Howard Hughes Medical Institute
Graduate students in the laboratory come from the following programs at the University of California, Berkeley:
Our lab does not recruit students directly. If you are interested in the lab, please apply to one of these programs.
Our lab is located on the 5th floor in Stanley Hall, pictured above.
Students in the lab generally come from a biochemistry, biophysics and/or molecular biology background. Students carry out research using the tools of X-ray crystallography, NMR, enzymology, biophysical chemistry, molecular biology or computational molecular simulations.
Current Graduate Students in the Lab
Aaron Cantor (Molecular and Cell Biology)
B.S., Case Western Reserve University (2008)
Luke Chao (Molecular and Cell Biology)
B.S., M.S. Brandeis University (2003)
Research Assistant - Dana Farber Cancer Institute/Broad Institute (2004-2005)
Currently I am working on structural and mechanistic studies of
calcium/calmodulin dependent protein kinase II (CaMKII), a
serine/threonine kinase involved in neuronal and cardiac signaling.
Kate Engel (Molecular and Cell Biology)
B.S., University of Wisconsin - Madison (2007)
I am presently researching inhibition methods of the epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR), a receptor tyrosine kinase whose dysregulation is implicated in many cancers. I am continuing the work of Xuewu Zhang by studying the molecular mechanism by which segments of the protein mitogen-inducible gene 6 (Mig6) inhibit EGFR. I am also working on a project in collaboration with Jim Wells, Michelle Arkin, and Mark Moasser at UCSF to discover small molecule and/or peptide inhibitors of the EGFR asymmetric dimer.
Joel Guenther (Chemistry)
BA, Carleton College (2002)
Undergraduate research with Jerry Mohrig on stereoselectivity of enolate addition on fluorinated substrates.
Currently I am studying the bacterial replicative DNA polymerase known as DNA polymerase III. The goal is to figure out how this polymerase recognizes DNA and how it binds to the proof reading exonuclease. One personal achievement in the lab has been to set up, with Meindert Lamers, a crystallization robotic system, which is now widely used by everyone in the lab.
Jodi Gureasko (Molecular and Cell Biology)
B.S., Carnegie Mellon University (2001)
Research Assistant, Sloan-Kettering Cancer Research Institute (2001 - 2003)
I am interested in understanding the regulatory
mechanisms that underlie the activation of the
Ras-specific nucleotide exchange factor Son of
Sevenless (SOS). Specifically, in collaboration
with Jay Groves in the Chemistry Department, I am
using model membrane surfaces to study the role
of membrane localization on SOS activity.
Randall McNally (Chemistry)
B.S., State University of New York, Binghamton (1999)
Beamline Operator for Protein Crystallography Research Resource, Brookhaven National Laboratory (2000-2002)
I'm studying the mechanism of how the clamp loader places the sliding clamp onto DNA during DNA replication, which involves using crystallography to examine how ATP and DNA binding induces conformational changes in the clamp loader and how the clamp-clamp loader complex recognizes DNA.
Kyle Simonetta (Molecular and Cell Biology)
B.A. Dartmouth College (2002)
Currently, I am interested in the structural mechanisms underlying the
functions of clamp loader complexes. Specifically, I am interested in how
clamp loaders recognize and bind to certain nucleic acid substrates and
how this binding is coupled to other activites of the clamp loader,
including ATPase activity and clamp release.
Patrick Visperas (Molecular and Cell Biology)
B.S., University of California, Davis (2006)
I am studying the regulatory mechanism and small molecule inhibition of Anaplastic Lymphoma Kinase (ALK), a receptor tyrosine kinase that when aberrantly regulated results in lymphoma as well as neuroblastoma. This work is being done in collaboration with Stephan W. Morris of St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital.