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Join us for Professor Doryen Bubeck’s Imperial Inaugural online or in person.
There is no need to register to attend so please be sure to use the add to calendar button.
We look forward to seeing you on Wednesday 12 March!
Summary
Proteins are tiny machines that perform a wide variety of functions in a cell. A cell is packed with nearly 42 million protein molecules, and each one has a special job to do. While some are needed to fight infection, others are made by pathogens to invade human cells. If we can understand how pathogen proteins interact with human defence systems, we move a significant step closer to developing new and effective ways to prevent disease.
Doryen Bubeck is a Professor of Structural Immunology at Imperial College London whose research uses cryo electron microscopy to visualize proteins in unprecedented detail. Through her early investigation of viruses to the seminal work on the complement immune system, she and her team have developed creative ways to image proteins in model membrane systems. In her inaugural lecture she will discuss some of the big questions that have motivated her to discover these how tiny machines work. By reflecting on personal experiences that have shaped her academic journey, she will explain how immune proteins punch holes in bacteria and how cells are protected when the immune system switches on.
Biography
Doryen Bubeck is Professor of Structural Immunology at Imperial College London and a satellite group leader at the Francis Crick Institute. After a B.Sc. at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, she was awarded a doctoral fellowship from the National Science Foundation to pursue a PhD in Biophysics at Harvard University. She then moved to the University of Oxford to work with Prof. Yvonne Jones under an EMBO postdoctoral fellowship and a subsequent fellowship from Cancer Research Institute. During this time, she developed a broad training in structural biology and a fascination with membrane biophysics which lay the foundation for her independent research career at Imperial College London. In 2012 she was appointed as a Lecturer in the Department of Life Sciences and was awarded a Career Establishment Award from CRUK to start her research group. She was promoted to Senior Lecturer in 2017, Reader in Structural Immunology in 2021 and Professor of Structural Immunology in 2023. She served as Director of the Centre for Structural Biology (2020-2023) and is currently the Director for Research for the Department of Life Sciences. Doryen serves on the Scientific Advisory Boards for several institutes and is a member of the MRC Nonclinical Training and Career Development Panel.