QBI presents a seminar with Yury Polikanov, Professor in the Department of Biological Sciences at the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences at University of Illinois Chicago.

Dr. Polikanov received a BS and MS in Biochemistry/Molecular Biology from Lomonosov Moscow State University in 2004 and completed a PhD in Cellular and Molecular Pharmacology at the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey and Rutgers University in 2008. He was a postdoc at Yale University in the lab of Thomas A. Steitz before joining UIC as a faculty in 2015. He received the 2018 UIC Rising Star – Researcher of the Year Award in Basic Life Sciences.

Dr. Polikanov’s research is focused on elucidating the structure and functions of the ribosome, understanding the basic principles of protein synthesis in bacteria, the modes of action of ribosome-targeting antibiotics, and mechanisms of drug resistance at a structural level. His laboratory uses a combination of cutting-edge X-ray crystallography and cryogenic-electron microscopy techniques to determine atomic-resolution structures of the bacterial ribosome in functional complexes with various translation factors and ribosome-targeting antibiotics as well as biochemical and microbiological methods to functionally characterize these complexes. Their studies provide the structural basis for the understanding of how different elements of the ribosome function together at molecular level.

Talk Title: Two birds, one stone: Antibacterials that target the ribosome and DNA gyrase and evade multiple resistance mechanisms

Hosted by Danica Fujimori