Department News
Current
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Maduke Lab's Kidney Chloride Channel Selectivity Paper Now Published in PNAS
Merritt Maduke's lab, with Ron Dror and Wah Chiu, published cryo-EM structures in PNAS showing how BIM1 selectively inhibits the CLC-Ka chloride channel over CLC-Kb — a key step toward hyponatremia drugs. A conserved lysine and a dynamic gating loop drive the selectivity, offering a blueprint for designing more selective inhibitors in the future. The channel had long been a promising drug target, but its close similarity to CLC-Kb made it difficult to hit safely until now.
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Khan Work Spotlighted in Nature Reviews Genetics
Yousuf Khan authored a journal club piece for Nature Reviews Genetics revisiting a landmark 1985 study that first documented programmed ribosomal frameshifting in retroviruses. He connected that historical discovery to his own lab's recent findings, published in Science Advances, showing that a similar frameshifting mechanism in the human PLEKHM2 gene produces a protein variant essential for normal heart muscle contraction.
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All Hands on Science Event a Resounding Success
On June 23, the Beckman Center welcomed 35 fourth- through eighth-grade students and eight chaperones for a day of campus tours, science demonstrations, art activities, and food, organized by the MCP's Community Collective Outreach subcommittee and its dedicated volunteers. The event was made possible by a generous gift from the William Townsend Foundation and additional support from the Beckman Center.
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MCP Faculty Candidate Announcement
MCP is excited to announce that we have narrowed down our extensive faculty candidate search to just 5 individuals. These 5 researchers will be visiting the department over the next two weeks and have been invited to speak to the department about their research.
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Welcome Stephen Hinshaw, PhD to MCP
Please welcome Stephen Hinshaw, PhD as our newest faculty member in the department! Dr. Hinshaw will launch an independent research program focused on structural and functional studies of the eukaryotic kinetochore on the 3rd floor of Beckman. He will also provide critical scientific and strategic direction for the Cryo-electron Microscopy Center (cEMc).
