March 31, 2022, Filed Under: NewsCongratulations to Mauro Mugnai! Mauro takes an independent research fellow position in the department of physics at Georgetown University, starting on April 1, 2022. Congratulations and best of luck to Mauro!
January 27, 2022, Filed Under: NewsCongratulations, Sumit Sinha! Sumit defensed his PhD thesis successfully and became Dr. Sinha! He is going to Harvard for his postdoc training. Congratulations and good luck!
May 3, 2021, Filed Under: NewsCongratulations, Ryota Takaki! Ryota Takaki has been offered a Postdoctoral position at Max Planck Institute in Dresden.
January 21, 2021, Filed Under: NewsCongratulations, Guang Shi! Guang Shi’s paper reporting a rigorous method to get 3D structures for Chromosomes from Hi-C data (a great paper!) has been accepted for publication in Physical Review X.
January 21, 2021, Filed Under: NewsCongratulations, Dr. Hyun Woo Cho Dr. Hyun Woo Cho will soon be Professor Hyun Woo Cho. He has accepted a position at Seoul National Tech.
September 3, 2020, Filed Under: NewsGroup Updates Yonathan Goldzvik started a postdoctoral fellowship in Cambridge University. Ed O’Brien, a former graduate student, garnered tenure in the Chemistry department in Penn State University. Way to go Ed! Former postdoctoral fellow, Mike Hinczewski, was granted tenure in the Physics Department in Case Western University. Congratulations Mike! Former graduate student, Shaon Chakraborty, started his independent career in NCBS Bangalore. Congrats, Shaon! Waiting for great things to come!
September 3, 2020, Filed Under: NewsDave Thirumalai was awarded the Hand Neurath award by the Protein Society in 2019 The citation reads, “Professor Thirumalai has been a pioneer in advancing our understanding of biomolecular actions, particularly protein and RNA folding, and the basis for how molecular motors convert energy to motion. Professor Thirumalai, one of the top theorists in delineating the principles of protein and RNA folding, is unique in driving and interpreting experiments, and collaborating with experimentalist colleagues. He was the first to quantify the heterogeneity and bumpiness of protein folding landscapes, through the definition of a glass temperature and its ratio with the folding temperature.”
April 20, 2020, Filed Under: NewsCongratulations to Naoto Hori! Naoto Hori has accepted a Nottingham Research Fellow position in the School of Pharmacy at Nottingham University in the United Kingdom starting March 2020.
October 25, 2018, Filed Under: NewsDave Thirumalai Awarded Langmuir Prize in Chemical Physics A chemist at the University of Texas at Austin has been awarded the top prize for chemical physics, given biennially by the American Physical Society. Devarajan Thirumalai received the Irving Langmuir Prize in Chemical Physics for his groundbreaking work in developing “analytical and computational approaches to soft-matter systems” and applying these approaches to “the transitional behavior of supercooled fluids and glasses, folding dynamics of protein and RNA biopolymers, and functioning of molecular motors.” The Irving Langmuir Prize is given every two years by the American Physical Society (APS) in recognition of outstanding interdisciplinary research in chemistry and physics. Thirumalai, who holds the Marvin K. Collie Regents Chair in Chemistry and the Larry R. Faulkner Departmental Chair for Excellence in Chemistry and Biochemistry at UT Austin, also holds an appointment in the Department of Physics. He uses theory and simulations to describe the peculiarities of dynamics of the liquid-to-glass transition, to develop methods rooted in polymer physics, and to elucidate the principles of protein and RNA folding and stepping kinetics of motors. His recent focus has been on developing physical models and theories to understand collective motion of cells, with a particular emphasis on tumor growth. Thirumalai is a fellow of the Royal Society of Chemistry, the Biophysical Society, and the APS. He is also the recipient of numerous awards, including the American Chemical Society Theoretical Chemistry Award from the Physical Chemistry Division, the Oesper Award from the University of Cincinnati, and a Humboldt Research Award for Senior U.S. Scientists. He is the visiting Weston Professor at the Weizmann Institute and a Korea Institute for Advanced Studies scholar. Thirumalai sits on the advisory committee at the Simons Center in the National Center for Biological Sciences, Bangalore. The Langmuir Prize, established in 1964 by the GE Foundation as a memorial to and in recognition of the accomplishments of Irving Langmuir in recognition of his career at GE, is given to only one recipient annually. In even-numbered years, the American Chemical Society selects the prize recipient and presents the $10,000 prize. Irving Langmuir received the 1932 Nobel Prize in Chemistry research on surface chemistry. APS announced its Spring 2019 prize and award recipients Tuesday. APS prizes and awards are open to all members of the scientific community in the U.S. and abroad, with award winners being selected by scientists who are appointed by APS. “Recognizing exceptional contributions in physics is one of the wonderful roles of our American Physical Society,” said APS President Roger Falcone. “We share in the joy of the recipients, take the opportunity afforded by the award of a prize to understand a bit more about that science, and reaffirm our commitment to excellence and peer evaluation of scientific research.” Thirumalai will receive the prize at a meeting of the APS in spring 2019.
August 8, 2018, Filed Under: NewsScientists Map a Complicated Ballet Performed in Our Cells For years, scientists have looked at human chromosomes, and the DNA they carried, poring over the genetic code that makes up every cell for clues about everything from our eye color to congenital diseases. In a new study, however, scientists have demonstrated the movement of chromosomes within cells also may play a role in human traits and health. In a paper just published in Nature Communications, scientists at The University of Texas at Austin have mapped the movement of a chromosome, using computer modeling to show how billions of base pairs of DNA get packed into an impossibly small space without getting tangled. For the first time, they showed that the movement is sluggish and glass-like, differing from one cell type to the next and even among cells of the same type. Understanding this movement better could have big implications for the study of genetic diseases, human health and gene editing. “Rather than the structure, we chose to look at the dynamics to figure out not onlyhow this huge amount of genetic information is packaged, but also how the various loci move,” said Dave Thirumalai, chair of UT Austin’s chemistry department. “We learned it is not just the genetic code you have to worry about. If the timing of the movement is off, you could end up with functional aberrations.” Thirumalai, along with Guang Shi, lead author and graduate student at the University of Maryland, looked at how two distinct chromosomes move. In a computer model, one chromosome starts out looking like an unrolled ball of yarn following replication. Slowly, the chromosome starts to fold in on itself. It forms chromosome droplets, like glassy beads strung on a necklace, before winding itself into a ball. The movement continues, even after the chromosome has reached this compact stage. “We found that the movement of the chromosomes was sluggish, reminiscent of glass-like behavior. We believe this might have profound consequences for how the cells behave both individually and collectively,” said Shi. “In addition, different regions of the chromosome move at different speeds.” The team chose to look at chromosomes 5 and 10, mapping how each moved. Genes found on chromosome 5 are associated with some forms of leukemia, Parkinson’s disease and aspects of male infertility. Genes on chromosome 10 are associated with types of porphyria, a blood disease; glioblastoma, an aggressive brain cancer; and a type of congenital deafness. In the model, it was clear that the movement of each chromosome changed, depending on the cell. For example, chromosome 5 in one cell could move very differently, more slowly perhaps, than in another cell. Thirumalai suggests thinking of DNA like a book with a recipe for a human, where the piece of information you need is on page 264. Reading the code is easy. But we now understand that the book is moving through time and space. That can make it harder to find page 264. “Gene expression, one of the most important biological functions of cells, is a dynamic process rather than a static state,” said Shi. “For every gene to be expressed in human cells, the distant regions of the chromosome must come into contact. When these dynamical processes are disrupted, cells may die due to the failure of expression of a few crucial genes or sometimes becomes a cancerous cell.” How long it takes for chromosomes to meet, when they meet and how long they remain in contact—things that studies like this one reveal—may improve scientists’ understanding of certain diseases, Shi said. The researchers hope to continue studying the dynamics of different types of chromosomes and exploring whether abnormal cells, like cancer cells, have different dynamics. “It would be very interesting to see if the chromosomes in a cancer cell, where there is some mutation, if the movement is different,” Thirumalai said. Researchers with the Korea Institute for Advanced study also contributed to the research. Funding came from the National Science Foundation and the Collie-Welch Regents Chair at the University of Texas at Austin. ABOUT THE AUTHOR Esther R Robards-Forbes Esther is an Austin native who spent more than 12 years as a newspaper journalist with publications like the Austin American-Statesman and the Charlotte Observer. When she’s not writing, she likes to travel, read and knit.
