Prof. Nir Ben-Tal

Dr. Shlomit Jacobi develops a Monte Carlo-based method for predicting stable packing conformations of two interacting transmembrane helices. She will use the method to predict conformations of the transmembrane domains of glycophorin A and various receptor tyrosine kinases (RTKs). Results will be correlated with deep sequencing in Sarel Fleishman’s lab.

Inbar Fish conducts in silico screening for lead-like compounds that could inhibit the kinases of pathogenic bacteria. Her first target is the tyrosine kinase CapB from the human pathogen Staphylococcus aureus, the structure of which is known. Good candidates will be examined in Meytal Landau’s lab. In parallel, the Landau lab tries to determine the structures of other bacterial kinases. When these will become available, Inbar will conduct in silico screening searching for putative inhibitors of these kinases too. Bacterial kinases differ from human kinases which should help designing specific inhibitors. Because of the sequence and structural difference it is anticipated that the mechanism will be different as well. We believe that the study will also reveal new mechanistic aspects that are unique to the bacterial kinases.

Names of PhD and Post-Doctoral students in the lab, that are funded by the center:

  1. Shlomit Jacobi, postdoc
  2. Inbar (Kaplan) Fish, PhD student