Rohit Pappu Explained

Rohit Pappu
Nationality:American
Field:Biophysics
Work Institutions:Washington University in St. Louis, Johns Hopkins University
Alma Mater:Tufts University, St. Joseph's College, Bangalore
Doctoral Advisor:David L. Weaver
Known For:Intrinsically disordered proteins, Huntington's disease, Protein folding, Biomolecular condensate

Rohit Pappu is an Indian-born computational and theoretical biophysicist. He is the Gene K. Beare Distinguished Professor of Engineering and the director of the Center for Science & Engineering of Living Systems (CSELS) at Washington University in St. Louis.

Education and career

Pappu did his undergraduate work in physics, mathematics, and electronics at the St. Joseph's College, Bangalore. He received an M.S. in solid-state physics in 1992 and Ph.D. in biological physics in 1996, both at Tufts University where he worked on theoretical aspects of protein folding. He spent two years as a postdoctoral fellow at Washington University in St. Louis with Jay Ponder and then from 1998 to 2001 he was a postdoctoral fellow with George Rose at Johns Hopkins University. He joined Washington University in St. Louis as an Assistant Professor in Biomedical Engineering in 2001, becoming Associate Professor in 2007 and Professor in 2011. He was inducted as the Edwin H. Murty Professor of Engineering in 2015, and as the Gene K. Beare Distinguished Professor in the Fall of 2021.[1]

Research

Pappu uses theoretical, computational, and experimental approaches to study intrinsically disordered proteins in the context of normal cellular function and neurodegenerative diseases (notably Huntington's disease[2]). He has made major contributions to understanding the driving forces associated with protein aggregation, and how the linear amino acid sequence of a disordered proteins determines its conformational behaviour, with a particular focus on the role of polar and charged amino acids.[3] [4] [5] [6] [7] [8] With postdoctoral fellow Rahul Das, Pappu discovered that the patterning of charged residues has a major impact on the conformational ensemble of a disordered protein.[9] More recently, his work has focussed on the polymer physics of biological phase transitions to understand the theoretical and molecular underpinnings that drive intracellular phase separation.[10] [11] [12]

Pappu was named a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) in 2013,[13] and in 2016 was elected as a fellow of the American Institute for Medical and Biological Engineering (AIMBE) for "outstanding contributions to protein engineering and design and the molecular basis of neurodegeneration through advances in computational biology".[14] In 2019, Pappu was named a fellow of the Biophysical Society for "ingeniously implementing polymer physics approaches and molecular simulations to characterize intrinsically disordered proteins", and as a Mercator Fellow by the German Science Foundation (Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft).[15] [16]

External links

Notes and References

  1. http://pappulab.wustl.edu/people.html#rohit Rohit Pappu, CV
  2. Web site: Huntington's Disease target of $4.5 million in NIH grants | the Source | Washington University in St. Louis. 12 May 2016.
  3. 10.1073/pnas.1320626110 . 24282292 . 3864320 . Unmasking the roles of N- and C-terminal flanking sequences from exon 1 of huntingtin as modulators of polyglutamine aggregation . Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences . 110 . 50 . 20075–80 . 2013 . Crick . S. L. . Ruff . K. M. . Garai . K. . Frieden . C. . Pappu . R. V. . 2013PNAS..11020075C . free .
  4. 10.1016/j.bpc.2011.04.006 . 21530061 . 3166968 . Assessing the contribution of heterogeneous distributions of oligomers to aggregation mechanisms of polyglutamine peptides . Biophysical Chemistry . 159 . 1 . 14–23 . 2011 . Vitalis . Andreas . Pappu . Rohit V. .
  5. 10.1016/j.sbi.2015.03.008 . 25863585 . 4512920 . Relating sequence encoded information to form and function of intrinsically disordered proteins . Current Opinion in Structural Biology . 32 . 102–12 . 2015 . Das . Rahul K . Ruff . Kiersten M . Pappu . Rohit V .
  6. 10.1073/pnas.0911107107 . 20404210 . 2889596 . Net charge per residue modulates conformational ensembles of intrinsically disordered proteins . Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences . 107 . 18 . 8183–8 . 2010 . Mao . A. H. . Crick . S. L. . Vitalis . A. . Chicoine . C. L. . Pappu . R. V. . 2010PNAS..107.8183M . free .
  7. 10.1073/pnas.0608175103 . 17075061 . 1629004 . Fluorescence correlation spectroscopy shows that monomeric polyglutamine molecules form collapsed structures in aqueous solutions . Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences . 103 . 45 . 16764–9 . 2006 . Crick . S. L. . Jayaraman . M. . Frieden . C. . Wetzel . R. . Pappu . R. V. . 2006PNAS..10316764C . free .
  8. 10.1021/ja512062h . 25664638 . 4418562 . Quantitative Assessments of the Distinct Contributions of Polypeptide Backbone Amides versus Side Chain Groups to Chain Expansion via Chemical Denaturation . Journal of the American Chemical Society . 137 . 8 . 2984–95 . 2015 . Holehouse . Alex S. . Garai . Kanchan . Lyle . Nicholas . Vitalis . Andreas . Pappu . Rohit V. .
  9. 10.1073/pnas.1304749110 . 23901099 . 3746876 . Conformations of intrinsically disordered proteins are influenced by linear sequence distributions of oppositely charged residues . Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences . 110 . 33 . 13392–7 . 2013 . Das . R. K. . Pappu . R. V. . 2013PNAS..11013392D . free .
  10. 10.1038/nphys3532 . Polymer physics of intracellular phase transitions . Nature Physics . 11 . 11 . 899–904 . 2015 . Brangwynne . Clifford P. . Tompa . Peter . Pappu . Rohit V. . 2015NatPh..11..899B . 4643961 .
  11. 10.1016/j.cell.2016.04.047 . 27212236 . 5127388 . Coexisting Liquid Phases Underlie Nucleolar Subcompartments . Cell . 165 . 7 . 1686–97 . 2016 . Feric . Marina . Vaidya . Nilesh . Harmon . Tyler S. . Mitrea . Diana M. . Zhu . Lian . Richardson . Tiffany M. . Kriwacki . Richard W. . Pappu . Rohit V. . Brangwynne . Clifford P. .
  12. 10.1016/j.molcel.2016.05.042 . 27392146 . 4973464 . Sequence Determinants of Intracellular Phase Separation by Complex Coacervation of a Disordered Protein . Molecular Cell . 63 . 1 . 72–85 . 2016 . Pak . Chi W. . Kosno . Martyna . Holehouse . Alex S. . Padrick . Shae B. . Mittal . Anuradha . Ali . Rustam . Yunus . Ali A. . Liu . David R. . Pappu . Rohit V. . Rosen . Michael K. .
  13. http://news.wustl.edu/news/Pages/26215.aspx, Two WUSTL faculty named AAAS fellowsNovember 25, 2013
  14. https://engineering.wustl.edu/news/Pages/Three-biomedical-engineering-professors-elected-as-AIMBE-Fellows-.aspx, January 21, 2016
  15. https://engineering.wustl.edu/news/2019/Pappu-awarded-Mercator-Fellowship-from-DFG.html, Pappu awarded Mercator Fellowship from DFG
  16. https://www.biophysics.org/news-room/bps-announces-2019-society-fellows, BPS Announces 2019 Society Fellows

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