Winslow Professor of Chemistry George Shields presented a seminar at the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, in New York City, on September 12. His talk, "Computational Design of a Small Peptide that Inhibits Breast Cancer" highlighted the work that his students have completed while working with Visiting Assistant Professor of Chemistry Karl Kirschner and himself.
The seminar focused in particular on the research of Katrina Lexa '05, Amanda Salisburg '08, and Katherine Alser '09, who have predicted the structure and dynamic motion of a small peptide that inhibits breast cancer in a cell line and in animal models. This project was started by Sam Bono '00, in collaboration with former biochemistry faculty member Steve Festin, and was developed extensively by Lorena Hernandez '03. Shields also discussed the recent progress in designing a computational assay for developing new molecules that target the Estrogen Receptor. This project, led by Karilyn Larkin '06, has used computational methods to predict the binding strength of estrogen, tamoxifen, raloxifene, and other molecules that bind to the Estrogen Receptor. Becky Mackenzie '08 and Alexa Schwarzman '09 assisted Karilyn in this research this past summer.
Shields also discussed the past senior thesis work of Sarah Taylor '03, Abby Markeson '04, Frank Pickard '05, Valery Danilack '06, as well as ongoing research by Sarah Felder '07, Marco Allodi '08, and Russell Holz '10.
Hamilton graduate Bono is now an optometrist working in the Mohawk Valley. Hernandez is in the MD/Ph.D. program at Albert Einstein College of Medicine. Taylor and Larkin are currently in medical school at NYU and Albany. Danilack is in graduate school studying public health at Yale, Markeson is at Fordham Law School, and Lexa and Pickard are pursuing Ph.D.s in medicinal and computational chemistry at the Universities of Michigan and Georgia.
