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Title : Demystifying the Early Events of Protein Aggregation in Neurodegenerative Diseases.
Speaker : Dr Krishnananda Chattopadhyay, Structural Biology and Bioinformatics, CSIR-Indian Institute of Chemical Biology, Kolkata
Date : 02/11/2022, 05:30 PM , Online.
Abstract :
Protein aggregation and deposition has been found to be a common phenotype in multiple neurodegenerative diseases. The heterogeneity of aggregation process and the presence of large number of triggering mechanisms results in the difficulty to devise therapeutic strategies against these toxic inclusions formation. Our laboratory has been investigating these triggers, which contribute to the alteration of folding pathways leading to the early and unexplored stages of aggregation. The conformational heterogeneity of the early intermediates and their transient nature are some of the reasons why traditional techniques do not typically work for the early stage detection. We have been using sensitive biophysical methods to directly detect and characterize the early intermediates and oligomers in vitro and inside live cells using Parkinson’s diseases (PD) and ALS as our models. We are also using cryo-EM to investigate the structural insights into the early intermediates, which are believed to the primary inducer of cellular toxicity. Using a combination of biophysics, biochemistry and microscopy, we are developing protein early intermediates vs toxicity maps to determine the structural insights responsible for the neuronal toxicity.
About the speaker:
Krishnananda Chattopadhyay is currently a Chief Scientist and the Head of the Structural Biology and Bioinformatics Division at CSIR-Indian Institute of Chemical Biology. His research group applies novel biochemical and biophysical tools at ensemble and single molecule resolution to study human diseases with particular emphasis to neurodegeneration and infections. He obtained his PhD degree from Tata Institute of Fundamental Research, Mumbai. He then moved to Washington University School of Medicine, Saint Louis, USA for his postdoctoral research. Before joining CSIR-Indian Institute of Chemical Biology in 2006, he worked at Pfizer, USA as a Senior Scientist. He is a fellow of Royal Society of Chemistry and West Bengal Academy of Science and Technology. He is also a fellow of Indo-US Science and Technology Forum and a recipient of American Chemical Society Membership Award. He is current the Lead of the Biophysics and Structural Biology Section of the Editorial Board of Communications Biology, a Nature Research Journal.
