Structural bioinformatics focuses on the identification and analysis of structure, dynamics and interaction of biological macromolecules in 3D space. While doing so, it aims to make connections between sequence ? structure and function of macromolecules. Information on structure is particularly important, especially for structure based drug discovery process. In this presentation, I would like to present different aspects of our research related to computational drug discovery and tool development. The talk will be divided into three sections; SNPs, Proteins and Capsids. In each section the use of these topics for drug discovery purposes will be discussed, and examples from our recent publications will be given. Examples will include analysis of the effects of non-synonymous SNPs in cardiovascular disease related proteins renin and angiotensinogen; hit identification in falcipains for malarial research; identification of dynamic conformations and allosteric binding sites that are not available from crystal structures for antibiotic development via analysis of E. coli heat shock protein 70 (Hsp70); and conservation and normal mode analysis of picornavirus capsids for drug and vaccine design.
Ozlem received her BSc degree in Physics from Bogazici University, Istanbul, Turkey. Then she moved to the Department of Molecular Biology and Genetics at the same University for her MSc degree. She obtained her PhD from Max-Planck Institute for Molecular Genetics and Free University, Berlin, Germany in 2003. She was co-founder and the first President of the student association of Max-Planck Institute in Berlin. While doing her PhD, Ozlem became interested in structural biology, and during her postdoctoral positions (Texas University, UWC and UP) she gained experience in structural bioinformatics as well as structural biology. In October 2009, Ozlem took up a senior lecturer position at Rhodes University, with the responsibility to develop postgraduate studies in bioinformatics at the University. She established Rhodes University Bioinformatics research group (RUBi) in 2010, and started one-year MSc programme in bioinformatics by coursework and research thesis in 2011. Since October 2013, RUBi is a research unit (Research Unit in Bioinformatics). Ozlem was the first president of the South African Society for Bioinformatics (SASBi) between 2012 and 2014. Ozlem?s broad research interest is comparative genomics, structural bioinformatics and bioinformatics education.
sumir.panji@uct.ac.za
The H3ABioNet Seminar co-ordinating team on behalf of the H3ABioNet Research Working Group.
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