Topic: Ion channels as an inspiration for synthetic chemists
Speaker: Professor Dirk Trauner, Perelman School of Medicine, University of Pennsylvania (UPenn)
Date and time: May 28, 16:00
Venue: Room 105, #5 Building of SPST
Host: Liang Guangxin
Abstract:
The lecture will demonstrate the awesome power of chemical synthesis with challenging target molecules and to use it toward the establishment of synthetic biological pathways. Using synthetic photoswitches as chemical tools, a broad range of targets in neuroscience have been able to be manipulated to fulfil certain functions, some of them hold promise as precision therapeutics.
Biography:
Dirk Trauner started his academic career in University of California, Berkeley. Before holding the current Penn Integrates Knowledge Professorship in the University of Pennsylvania, he has also served in the University of Munich and New York University sequentially. Although a leading synthetic chemist, he is also well known for his pioneering contributions to optogenetics and photopharmacology. He has been awarded ACS Cope Scholar Award, the Emil Fischer Medal, and the Otto Bayer Award. He is a Member of the German National Academy of Sciences, Leopoldina, a Corresponding Member of the Austrian Academy of Sciences, and a Fellow of the Royal Society of Chemistry. He is also the recipient of the Kitasato Medal, the Alfred P. Sloan Fellowship, an ERC Advanced Grant. He sits on the editorial board of Organic Syntheses, the editorial advisory board of ACS Central Science, ACS Chemical Neuroscience, Cell Chemical Biology, and Chem.