The rockefeller university

Event Details

Type

Other Tri-Institutional Events

Speaker(s)

9:00 a.m.: Joshua Levitz, Ph.D., Professor of Biochemistry and Biophysics, Weill Cornell Medicine, Harnessing Neuromodulatory GPCRs for Targeted Therapeutic Approaches

10:05 a.m.: Jaina Wollowitz, TPCB Student, Heller Laboratory, Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, Nanosensor-based Pregnancy Outcome Prediction & Biomarker Discovery

10:45 a.m.: Kaylyn Spotton, TPCB Student, Brady Laboratory, The Rockefeller University, Leveraging a Convergently Evolved ClpP-Targeting Warhead for Antibiotic Discovery

11:10 a.m.: Rommie Amaro, Ph.D., Professor and Endowed Chair of Chemistry and Biochemistry, University of California, San Diego, Multiscale Computational Microscopy for In Situ Protein Dynamics & Therapeutic Design

3:15 p.m.: Harold Varmus, M.D., Lewis Thomas University Professor of Medicine, Weill Cornell Medicine, Remarks on TPCB

3:30 p.m.: Jason Sello, Ph.D., Professor of Pharmaceutical Chemistry, University of California, San Francisco, Illuminating New Pathways in Biology and Medicine Using Small Molecules

4:35 p.m.: Jared Ramsey, TPCB Student, Kapoor Laboratory, The Rockefeller University, Mechanism of Allosteric Inhibition of a Viral Helicase

5:00 p.m.: Emily Balskus, Ph.D., Professor of Chemistry and Chemical Biology, Harvard University and HHMI, Deciphering the Human Microbiome with Chemistry

Speaker bio(s)

JOSHUA LEVITZ is Professor of Biochemistry and Biophysics at Weill Cornell Medicine. He received a B.S. in biology and a B.S. in physics from American University, and worked in the lab of Miguel Holmgren at the NIH as an undergraduate. As a Ph.D. student and postdoctoral fellow in the lab of Prof. Ehud Isacoff at the University of California, Berkeley, Prof. Levitz developed and applied new optical approaches to study the activation mechanisms and neurophysiology of glutamate receptors and ion channels. His research program uses a variety of optical techniques to study synaptic signaling molecules with a focus on neurotransmitter-gated G protein-coupled receptors (GPCRs). The Levitz Lab is interested in probing GPCRs at the molecular, synaptic, and circuit levels to understand their roles in physiology and neuropsychiatric disease.

ROMMIE AMARO is Professor and Endowed Chair of Chemistry and Biochemistry at the University of California, San Diego. Prof. Amaro earned her bachelor's degree in chemical engineering and Ph.D. in chemistry at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign with Prof. Zan Luthey-Schulten, and was an NIH postdoctoral fellow with Prof. Andrew McCammon at the University of California, San Diego. Prof. Amaro’s research program develops and applies advanced computational methods to drug discovery and molecular biophysics, collaborating with experimentalists to catalyze the discovery of new potential therapeutics. The lab also creates multiscale simulations and modeling approaches spanning atoms to whole cells. Key areas of focus in the Amaro lab include computational translational research, addressing complexity in molecular recognition, and computational virology.

JASON K. SELLO is Professor of Pharmaceutical Chemistry at the University of California, San Francisco, having previously spent thirteen years as a chemistry professor at Brown University. Prof. Sello earned a Ph.D. in biophysics from Harvard University (2002), studying diversity-oriented chemical synthesis under Prof. Stuart L. Schreiber, and a B.S. in biology, magna cum laude, from Morehouse College (1997). Prof. Sello studied antibiotic biosynthesis enzymes as a post-doc at Harvard Medical School with Prof. Christopher T. Walsh, and RNA processing in Streptomyces as a visiting scientist at the John Innes Centre. In his independent career, Prof. Sello has synergistically used experimental methods from chemistry, biophysics, biochemistry, and genetics to study biological phenomena and to develop new therapeutics for infections, cancer, and neurological disorders.

EMILY BALSKUS is Professor of Chemistry and Chemical Biology at Harvard University, as well as an Associate Member of the Broad Institute of Harvard and MIT, a Faculty Associate of the Microbial Sciences Initiative at Harvard, and a Howard Hughes Medical Institute Investigator. Prof. Balskus graduated from Williams College in 2002 and received her Ph.D. with Prof. Eric Jacobsen at Harvard University in 2008. From 2008–2011, she was an NIH postdoctoral fellow at Harvard Medical School with Prof. Christopher T. Walsh. Prof. Balskus’ research focuses on deciphering microbial metabolism and its role in complex microbial ecosystems like the human gut microbiome. Using chemical knowledge and tools, Prof. Balskus and her group seek to discover new microbial enzymes and metabolites as well as elucidate their biological roles.

Open to

Public

Host

Tri-Institutional PhD Program in Chemical Biology (TPCB)

Reception

Refreshments, 6:00 p.m.

Phone

(503) 444-1652

Sponsor

Shawn Davis
(212) 327-8072
sdavis01@rockefeller.edu

Readings

https://chembio.triiprograms.org/publications-news/symposium-2026/

Notes

Registration required (free)