Renowned biochemist to address role of metal ionsMarch 15, 2010 KALAMAZOO--The important biological function of metal ions will be explored Friday, March 19, when Dr. Ivano Bertini delivers the inaugural Life Sciences Lecture at Western Michigan University. Bertini will speak on "Metalloproteomes and Their Place in Mechanistic Systems Biology" at 5 p.m. in Room 1720 of the Chemistry Building. A reception will be held prior to the lecture. It will begin at at 4:15 p.m. in the Chemistry Building lobby. Both events are open to the public free of charge. In 1999, Bertini founded the Magnetic Resonance Center, also known as Centro Risonanze Magnetiche or CERM, at the University of Florence, one of the largest centers in the world for structural biology. The center houses an impressive battery of nuclear magnetic resonance spectrometers, providing a major NMR infrastructure and becoming the principal research center for NMR in the life sciences in Europe. Ancillary laboratories and spin-off institutions have flourished around CERM in the fields of biotechnology and drug discovery. After beginning his research in theoretical and physical inorganic chemistry, he has studied the structure-function relationship of metalloproteins through biophysical methods since 1975. In 1990, he transformed his lab into an NMR lab for structural biology of metalloproteins and eventually pioneered the exploitation of genome data banks. He has studied electron and nuclear relaxation from both experimental and theoretical points of view and has established a molecular biology department for high-throughput protein expression in structural genomics projects on metalloproteins. He has published more than 600 research articles and has solved more than 100 protein structures. Bertini is a member of the Academia Europaea and the Italian Accademia dei Lincei (Italian Academy of Sciences). He has been on the editorial staff or advisory board of 20 of the most authoritative journals in chemistry, biochemistry and inorganic chemistry. For information, contact Dr. David Huffman, WMU associate professor of chemistry, at david.huffman@wmich.edu or (269) 387-2865. Media contact: Mark Schwerin, (269) 387-8400, mark.schwerin@wmich.edu WMU News |
