CSSB: Newsletter 19

Marlovits group PhD student receives two awards

Jiri Wald from the Marlovits has received the Heinrich Nethler-Promotionspreis for Molecular Biology from "Der Freundes- und Förderkreis des Universitätsklinikums Hamburg-Eppendorf." He was also one of five students at the Vienna BioCenter who were recognized for the best PhD theses from the programme.

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In-person SAB Meeting

We were happy to be able to welcome members of our Scientific Advisory Board to Hamburg this year. Our first in-person SAB meeting since 2019 took place from 27-28 October. CSSB scientific staff contributed to presentations, group discussions and a poster session.

Panel Discussion: Taming new pathogens - Virus research with AI

CSSB and the AdWHH hosted the panel discussion entitled "Taming new pathogens - Virus research with AI" on 20 September. Approximately 60 guests attended this event in person. Prof. Dr. Maya Topf, Prof. Dr. Blanche Schwappach-Pignataro, and Prof. Dr. Kay Grünewald were part of the panel with Dr. Jan Kosinski contributing as a special guest. The discussion was followed by a reception, which gave the guests a chance to chat with the panel members. A video of the panel discussion is available via the link below.

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New areas of application for existing drugs

Medicines are usually approved for the treatment of a specific disease. However, other areas of application often emerge later. In order to make the so-called repurposing more efficient, a comprehensive networking platform is to be set up as part of an EU project. CSSB Scientific Director Prof. Dr. Kay Grünewald (UHH, LIV) and his Universität Hamburg colleague Prof. Dr Jan Baumbach and their teams are involved in the project.

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CSSB 3rd International Symposium

The CSSB Symposium 2023, "Charting the landscape of infection: From entry to exit" will focus on the biology of infections and highlight different key cellular processes leading to pathogen proliferation. The symposium will take place from 3-5 May 2023. Registration will be open in January 2023.

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Mapping Atoms

To facilitate the building of molecular models, the Marlovits group developed StarMap, an easy-to-use software program for molecular refinements using Rosetta. A description of the StarMap software package was recently published in Nature Protocols.

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How do molecular motors convert chemical energy in to mechanical work?

The research team of Thomas C. Marlovits from the Centre for Structural Systems Biology (CSSB, DESY) and the University Medical Center Hamburg-Eppendorf (UKE) in Hamburg reveal the architecture, complete functional cycle and the mechanism of a molecular motor: The team reports in the journal Nature, how a 'RuvAB branch migration complex' converts chemical energy into mechanical work to perform recombination and repair of DNA.

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Deciphering two antimicrobial amyloid structures using cryo-electron microscopy.

Researchers from CSSB and collaborators have deciphered the structure of two antimicrobial peptides (AMPs) from frogs. The AMPs act as a toxin against microbes and have a similar structure to human protein fragments associated with Alzheimer's and Parkinson's disease, respectively. The findings were published in July 2022 in the journal Nature Communications.

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Novel Exit: A New Pathway is Revealed

The Bosse group (MHH, LIV), at the Centre for Structural Systems Biology CSSB, has revealed a novel exit pathway used by the Human Cytomegalovirus (HCMV) to spread infection in human cells. The research study, published in PLOS Pathogens, shows that HCMV can release new virus particles in bulk pulses

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