Natural product discovery & biosynthesis
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A majority of antibiotics and drugs that we use in the clinic are derived or inspired from small organic molecules called Natural Products that are produced by living organisms such as bacteria, fungi, and plants. Natural Products are at the forefront of fighting the global epidemic of antibiotic resistant pathogens, and keeping the inventory of clinically applicable pharmaceuticals stocked up. Some Natural Products are also potent human toxins and pollutants, and we need to understand how these toxins are produced to minimize our exposure to them.
We as biochemists ask how and why are Natural Products produced in Nature, what we can learn from Natural Product biosynthetic processes, and how we can exploit Nature's synthetic capabilities for interesting applications? Find out more about our Science, browse the Publications, and meet The Team. |
News
August 2024 Dongqi and Mujeeb's paper on engineering polyketide synthases, and challenges therein is published in Biochemistry. Congrats!
August 2024 Weimao publishes in J Org Chem the structure of a macrocyclic peptide natural product from marine sponges with McShan, Oyelere, and Garg labs. Congrats!
August 2024 Grace is awarded the GAANN fellowship. WooOOOoooo.
August 2024 Vidya is awarded the Bagwell Fellowship, and we welcome Beeta to the lab to work with Vidya on making new peptidic natural products. W.A.Y. T.O. G.O.!.!.!.
July 2024 Weimao's review on marine Microbulbifer bacteria is is published. Fascinating bacteria; custodians of the sea doing interesting chemistry!
June 2024 Vinny is awarded the ASP Matt Suffness Young Investigator Award. Thanks, ASP!!
June 2024 Vinny and Prof. McShan's perspective on protein and peptide structure prediction is out in Nature Chemical Biology.
September 2023 Weimao reports the discovery, structures, and biosynthetic gene clusters for pseudobulbiferamide natural products in Journal of Natural Products. Our discovery and biosynthesis efforts from marine Microbulbifer bacteria are in full swing!
July 2023 Dongqi and Luna defend their theses and are awarded their PhDs. Dongqi is headed to IFF Inc., and Luna to Merck. Sad, happy, and proud to see them head to their careers.
June 2023 Luna PUBLISHES in Biochemistry. Activity of a peptide brominase and Suzuki coupling on brominated peptidic products. Really difficult enzyme to work with!
May 2023 $$$! Vinny is awarded the Camille Dreyfus Teacher Scholar award. Teaching and research go hand-in-hand, as they should!
April 2023 Weimao PUBLISHES in ChemBioChem. Structures and biosynthesis of ureidohexapeptide natural products from marine bacteria.
April 2023 Dongqi PUBLISHES in ACS Chem Biol. Engineering of polyketide syntheses is a terrible idea, Dongqi tells us why.
March 2023 $$$! The NSF CAREER award comes in to support our work on peptidic natural products. Thanks NSF!!!
June 2022 Luna and Dongqi head to industry to spend their summers in internships. We are happy for them to have a diverse work experience as they chart our their future careers!!
June 2022 Happy to welcome two new postdocs, Dr. Nirmal Saha and Dr. Weimao Zhong, to the lab. Check out our 'teams' page for their background and interests.
June 2022 Dongqi PUBLISHES in ACS Chem Biol. Discovery of a new enzyme by making large polyketide synthase enzymes work in a test tube.
May 2022 Luna PUBLISHES in ACS Chem Biol. Genome mining and heterologous production of peptidic natural products; also, engineering new natural products.
May 2022 Ipsita heads to UC San Diego to start postdoc tenure with Pieter Dorrestein and Rob Knight.
April 2022 Ipsita defends her thesis. First PhD graduate from our lab!!
November 2021 Ipsita PUBLISHES in ACS Omega. Isotope dilution mass spectrometry with marine sponge tissues tells us absolute abundances of (non)proteinogenic amino acids.
November 2021 Emily is awarded the Georgia Tech PURA. Killing it!!
August 2021 Ipsita and Nadine head to the Florida Keys for a field trip to get some sponges. Best part of our work.
June 2021 Luna PUBLISHES in JACS. Discovery of a peptidyl brominase in exceptionally abundant RiPP BGCs in marine sponge microbiomes. Collaboration with Eric.
June 2021 Ipsita and Luna PUBLISH in ChemBioChem. Enzymatic synthesis assisted discovery and sequencing of peptidic natural products from marine sponges.
June 2021 $$$s. The lab is awarded the NIGMS MIRA.
May 2021 Dongqi PUBLISHES in JACS in collaboration with JC and Will.
April 2021 Nadine is awarded the Georgia Tech President's Undergraduate Research Award. Nadine will be spending her summer in the lab isolating molecules from marine sponges and running antibacterial assays. Congratulations Nadine!
February 2021 Ipsita and Subhasish PUBLISH in mSystems. Sponges united by natural product chemistry can have very different microbiomes. Data from Atlantic and Pacific sponges.
February 2021 $$$s. Vinny is awarded the 2021 Cottrell Scholar Award in chemistry. Thanks RCSA!
February 2021 Scary, but everyone is safe. Thanks to Georgia Tech surveillance testing, getting a +ve/-ve test takes about a day. Executing smart quarantines and getting out of them is easier.
February 2021 Multiple COVID cases reported in our building. Powering down, getting tested, and coming back after a deep clean. Gotta stay safe.
January 2021 Kicking off the new year with Hem's paper describing how marine cyanobacteria make ozone-damaging bromoform accepted in J Phycology.
December 2020 Happy to welcome new students to the lab. Welcome Ashley, Brendan, and Dev.
October 2020 Subhasish joins the team. Molecules will be made.
July 2020 Funding $$$!! NSF funds our collaborative research proposal with JC and Eric. Commencing countdown, engines on...
July 2020 Ipsita and Dongqi PUBLISH in ACS Chemical Biology. Did we talk about how awesome the mass spec core at Georgia Tech is? Fortunate to have access to these top of the line mass specs.
July 2020 Hem heads over to the CDC to start his new position. Bummed to see him go, though we are glad he will be around in Atlanta still. To greater and better things.
July 2020 Vinny is awarded the Blanchard Assistant Professorship by GT School of Chem and Biochem. Aww, thanks y'all.
May 2020 Hem and Dongqi PUBLISH! The bromoform paper is accepted at ACS Chem Biol. Learning about seaweeds. So exciting to have new systems to work with. Thanks Eric and Jen and so many others who helped us.
March 2020 Research activities have ceased and we have shut down the lab as we minimize person-to-person contact to contain the virus. Instruments are resting. Feels weird to close down the lab, unsettling. Hope we all come out of this well.
February 2020 Ipsita PUBLISHES! 17 days from initial submission to acceptance, got to be some kind of record. Or is it the length of the SI file?
January 2020 Welcome back to the lab Sarah Pennebaker. Sarah is a Stamps Fellow at Georgia Tech and will be doing undergraduate research with Hem.
October 2019 Ipsita won the second prize for her oral presentation describing natural product metabolomes of marine sponges at the GT Chemistry graduate student retreat. Go Ipsita!!
October 2019 HPLC is installed and has been christened "Yoda". We are back and stable now.
September 2019 Our new HPLC is here (with the fraction collector) but we are having to wait a month before it is installed. The wait is killing us and making us unstable.
September 2019 Hem talks about his work at the Georgia Tech postdoctoral research symposium. Go Hem!
September 2019 Vinny is awarded the Harold Nation young faculty award at Georgia Tech. Thank you judges.
August 2019 Our paper describing the complex metabolome of a marine sponge is now online.
July 2019 Ipsita passes her candidacy exam in fine style. Congratulations Ipsita!
July 2019 Owen Glogovsky and Anusha Jain head back to Lipscomb and UGA after their summer REU and volunteer internships in the lab. Best of luck Owen and Anusha.
July 2019 We are awarded a Petit Institute seed grant with Shu Takayama. Time to learn engineering.
May 2019 Andrew graduates and moves to Knoxville for research for a year. Good luck Andrew!
March 2019 Our review on marine sponge microbiology and natural products with Val Paul and Chris Freeman is online.
January 2019 We are excited to welcome Hassaan Asif, Sarah Pennebaker, and Bryce Smith for undergraduate research in the lab.
January 2019 A Happy New Year to Hem and the team with a paper accepted in ACS Biochemistry. Congratulations Hem.
October 2018 Chemistry graduate students Luna and Dongqi join the lab.
August 2018 We're excited to welcome Michelle Kim to the lab. Michelle is a high school senior who will be interning in the lab.
June 2018 Andrew is awarded the Georgia Tech PURA. Congrats Andrew!
May 2018 A warm welcome to James Bailey from Xavier U as a summer REU student.
April 2018 Hem heads to Solomon Islands for sample collection trip. Thanks Eric for hosting us..