Krishna Saxena joined the SGC Frankfurt July 2020. Krishna studied Biochemistry in Frankfurt (Germany) followed by a PhD (1999) in heterologous expression of membrane proteins at the Institute of Biochemistry (Frankfurt). Then, he was leading a molecular biology and protein expression group for a collaboration between Aventis Research & Technologies and the Goethe University (1999-2001), later MRPharm (2001-2002), a biotechnology company spin out of Frankfurt University and shortly part of Affinium Pharmaceuticals. The focus of his work became structure-based drug discovery by NMR spectroscopy and X-ray diffraction. From 2003-2011, he was working as a group leader (collaboration Sanofi and Goethe University) to study the family of protein kinases and subsequently to investigate biomedically relevant protein-protein interactions (PPIs) with focus on the modulation of such interactions by low molecular weight ligands guided by NMR technology. Since 2012, he has worked in the drug development platform at the DKTK German Cancer Consortium and for several industrial collaborations.
Thomas Hanke studied Pharmacy at the Goethe University in Frankfurt. In 2014, he completed his PhD in the field of pharmaceutical chemistry, investigating the synthesis and pharmacological characterization of dual 5-lipoxygenase and microsomal prostaglandin E2 synthase-1 inhibitors as a new alternative strategy for anti-inflammatory drugs. In 2015, he joined Stefan Knapp´s group where he is working on the development of chemical probes for targeting kinases. For that, he is pursuing different strategies, including the synthesis of allosteric kinase inhibitors (e.g. for LIMK1/2) and the synthesis of macrocyclic compounds to generate new chemistry for targeting kinases.
Susanne Müller-Knapp studied Human Biology in Marburg Germany followed by a PhD in molecular biology at the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm, Sweden (1997). She then had more than 6 years of postdoctoral training in the area of inflammation and gene regulation at the Karolinska Institute and at the DIBIT San Raffaele Scientific Institute in Milan, Italy.
In 2004 Susanne joined the Structural Genomics Consortium, SGC, in Oxford. The SGC is an international public private partnership that currently comprises 8 international pharmaceutical companies and a large network of academic and industrial collaborators. Susanne worked at the SGC first as External Research Manager and then Scientific Coordinator. She has been the Project Manager of the Epigenetic Probe Project, which generates tool compounds with defined specificity and selectivity for epigenetic targets and the cell based assay group at the SGC in Oxford testing the cellular activity of the in vitro characterized tool compounds. In her role as Chief Operating Officer at the SGC Frankfurt Susanne is now coordinating several probe programs including the global SGC kinase chemical probe program and the donated probe program, which makes probes available from the pharmaceutical partners of the SGC. She is also Director of Operations of the Chemical Probes Portal, an online platform, providing e recommendations for the right choice and use of chemical probes https://www.chemicalprobes.org/.
The Cellular assay group establishes cellular model systems to establish the efficacy of the developed inhibitors and then further uses them to increase the knowledge of the biological function of the targeted proteins as well as validate their role in disease as a target for pharmacological intervention.
Prof Stefan Knapp studied Chemistry at the University of Marburg (Germany) and at the University of Illinois (USA). He did his PhD in protein crystallography at the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm (Sweden) (1996) and continued his career at the Karolinska Institute as a postdoctoral scientist (1996-1999). In 1999, he joined the Pharmacia Corporation as a principal research scientist in structural biology and biophysics. He left the company in 2004 to set up a research group at the Structural Genomics Consortium at Oxford University (SGC). From 2008 to 2015 he was a Professor of Structural Biology at the Nuffield Department of Clinical Medicine (NDM) at Oxford University (UK) and between 2012 and 2015 he was the Director for Chemical Biology at the Target Discovery Institute (TDI). He joined Frankfurt University (Germany) in 2015 as a Professor of Pharmaceutical Chemistry and the Buchmann Institute of Molecular Life Sciences. He remains associated to the SGC as a visiting Professor at Oxford and he is also adjunct Professor of the George Washington University. Since 2017 he is the CSO of the newly founded SGC node at the Goethe-University Frankfurt. His research interests are the rational design of selective inhibitors that target protein kinases as well as protein interactions modules that function as reader domains of the epigenetic code.
My laboratory is interested in understanding molecular mechanisms that regulate protein function of key signalling molecules and how these mechanisms can be utilized for the development of highly selective and potent inhibitors (chemical probes). As a basis for this work we have generated a comprehensive set of high resolution crystal structures that cover most members of the protein family of interest. We are particularly interested in protein interactions module of the bromodomain family that specifically recognize ε-N-lysine acetylation motifs, a key event in the reading process of epigenetic marks. This effort generated several highly selective chemical probes targeting bromodomains. A second research focus is on protein kinases. Our laboratory has solved a comprehensive set of crystal structure of this large protein family offering the opportunity to understand molecular mechanisms of their regulation and developing new strategies for their selective targeting. We developed for example a number of highly selective inhibitors by exploring unusual binding modes and allosteric binding sites. A particular focus of the laboratory is also to understand structural mechanisms leading to slow binding kinetics as part of the K4DD consortium.
Rafael M. Couñago, PhD, is a Principal Investigator at the Structural Genomics Consortium Chemical Biology Center at the University of North Carolina (SGC-UNC), Chapel Hill. Rafael´s research group at SGC-UNC uses protein biochemistry, structural biology and cell-based assays to illuminate protein function and explore new therapeutic strategies for human diseases. Current research at SGC-UNC is focused on enabling the discovery of new antiviral compounds and realizing SGC´s vision for Target 2035, an open science initiative that aims to create chemical and biological tools for every protein in the human genome with the goal of informing drug discovery (https://www.target2035.net/). Rafael joined SGC-UNC after working as a Principal Investigator at the Center of Medicinal Chemistry at the University of Campinas (UNICAMP), São Paulo, Brazil. Prior to that, Rafael served as Team Leader and CSO at SGC-UNICAMP, and was a post-doctoral researcher at the laboratories of Bostjan Kobe at the University of Queensland, Australia; Kurt Krause at Otago University, New Zealand, and Youssif Shamoo at Rice University, USA. Rafael has a strong track record in recombinant protein production, biochemical and cellular assay development, and structure determination, and has participated in a number of early-stage drug discovery projects in collaboration with both academic and industrial partners
David Drewry is a renowned leader in the medicinal chemistry of protein kinases and is one of the principal architects of the research strategy at the SGC-UNC to build an open and collaborative research network to promote target discovery. He previously enjoyed more than 24 years as a medicinal chemist with GlaxoSmithKline and legacy companies, where he led teams working across the preclinical spectrum of drug discovery. His research interests include the art and science of medicinal chemistry, kinase inhibitor design, utilization of annotated sets of kinase inhibitors to build understanding of signaling networks and precompetitive chemical biology to facilitate target identification. After earning a Bachelor’s of Science degree, cum laude, in chemistry from Yale University, Drewry earned his doctorate at the University of California, Berkeley in the laboratory of Paul Bartlett, working on the design, synthesis and mechanistic studies of zinc protease inhibitors. Drewry is currently the head of chemistry at Meryx Pharmaceuticals, a biotech startup focused on small-molecule inhibitors of Mer kinase that was a spinoff from the UNC Eshelman School of Pharmacy. Drewry enjoys running, reading and relaxing with his family at local restaurants, the movie theater or in the kitchen playing board games.
Alison Axtman is a synthetic medicinal chemist with more than 10 years of research experience working at the interface of chemical and biology. Alison earned her PhD in Medicinal Chemistry at the University of Kansas, and carried out her post-doctoral training in the Department of Chemistry at Stanford University. Alison’s research has focused on the synthesis of small molecules that selectively modulate proteins implicated in disease-propagating pathways. As a member of the GSK Chemical Biology department, she led a program to understand the molecular basis of immune modulation by a class of natural products and developed analogs with improved drug properties. Alison is currently a Research Assistant Professor in the Chemical Biology and Medicinal Chemistry Department in the UNC Eshelman School of Pharmacy. At the SGC-UNC, she leads the design of novel chemical probes for understudied protein kinases that will be openly shared with collaborators to facilitate target discovery in human disease-relevant assays. When she’s not in the lab, Alison can be most often found at the gym preparing for the next CrossFit or GRID competition with her teammates.
Tim Willson is chief scientist of the SGC-UNC, an open-discovery network for protein kinases based at the UNC Eshelman School of Pharmacy. He has more than 25 years of experience in pharmaceutical research with a track record in discovery of first-in-class clinical candidates. Throughout his career, Willson has been an advocate for research on pioneer drug targets. He led the Glaxo program on orphan nuclear receptors that uncovered their role in regulation of human metabolism and was co-discoverer of obeticholic acid, a breakthrough medicine for liver diseases targeting FXR. Willson has been a long time supporter of precompetitive chemistry in early drug discovery and was a scientific founder of the SGC Epigenetic Chemical Probes project. He is widely recognized for scientific leadership in chemical biology and was named one of the world’s 400 most influential biomedical researchers. Outside of science, Willson enjoys the challenge of long course triathlons and has completed six Ironman 70.3 distance races.
Willson has been a long-time supporter of precompetitive chemistry as a mechanism to bring innovation to early drug discovery. His team has made potent and selective chemical probes for orphan nuclear receptors widely available in the scientific community. He was a scientific founder of the SGC Epigenetic Chemical Probes project that led to the release into the public domain of more than 30 chemical probes that specifically inhibit enzyme modifiers and protein readers of the histone tails.
Michael Sundstrom received his PhD from Uppsala, followed by Postdoctoral studies at Karolinska Institute. From 1993-2000 he was at Pharmacia as Director for structure-based drug design and oncology R&D portfolio management. Between 2001 and 2003 he held senior positions at the Swedish Biotechs Actar and Biovitrum. In 2003 he joined the Structural Genomics Consortium (SGC) at the University of Oxford, as Chief Scientist. In 2007 he assumed the position as Managing Director for the Novo Nordisk Foundation Center for Protein Research (Copenhagen). In 2011, he was Vice President of Discovery Research at Karolinska Development. He then re-joined the SGC inmid-2014, as Scientific Director of European Initiatives at SGC.
Michael has three main responsibilities within the SGC; i) member of the global research leadership team coordinating projects and activities of common interest within the consortium; ii) site head for SGC Karolinska and iii) main scientific focus and responsibility for the SGC Tissue Platforms in Stockholm, Frankfurt, Toronto and Montreal; working to establish high quality cell-based assays using patient-derived cell systems in inflammation, oncology and neurodegenerative diseases.
Michael currently leads (ad interim) the efforts in the Tissue Assay platform at SGC Karolinska.
During his postdoctoral work at The Neuro, Carl studied the major Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis disease gene C9ORF72. Through an antibody validation pipeline that he developed, Carl characterized all known C9ORF72 commercial antibodies and found that the most cited antibody does not recognize the protein in any application, but had been cited in dozens of papers cited thousands of times. Carl and Peter McPherson are further developing the pipeline as a technology solution, along with a sustainable business model, to address the antibody liability crisis. The technology platform, called the NeuroSGC Antibody Characterization Platform, is now being formally implemented at The Neuro through the creation of an Antibody Characterization Group. This group functions in partnership with ten leading antibody/KO cell manufacturers who are distinguished by a commitment to reagent quality and contribute significant cash and in-kind resources to the initiative.