Ordered Supramolecular Structures and Condensates in Innate Immunity
Event Details
- Type
- Friday Lecture Series
- Speaker(s)
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Hau Wu, Ph.D., senior investigator, program in cellular and molecular medicine, Boston Children’s Hospital; Asa and Patricia Springer Professor of Structural Biology, professor, department of biological chemistry and molecular pharmacology, Blavatnik Institute, Harvard Medical School
- Speaker bio(s)
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Dr. Wu's talk will focus on structures and functions of the fascinating system of inflammasomes, which are cytosolic supramolecular complexes that activate caspase-1 and other inflammatory caspases. Upon caspase activation, pro-cytokines in the interleukin-1 family and the pore-forming protein GSDMD are proteolytically processed, resulting in cytokine maturation, and formation of large transmembrane GSDMD pores to release cytokines and to induce the lytic cell death pyroptosis.
The inflammasome system offers a variety of proteins that form large oligomers, often as peripheral or integral transmembrane proteins, to drive enzymatic chemistry or other cellular processes. At least sometimes, these oligomerization processes are preceded by phase separation to increase the local concentration and to promote the supramolecular complex assembly and the resulting chemistry.
The Wu lab uses a combination of biochemistry, cryo-electron microscopy, cellular imaging and inflammasome assays to elucidate the structures and functions of inflammasomes.
Dr. Hau Wu received pre-medical training at Peking University and studied Medicine at Peking Union Medical College. She performed her Ph.D. and postdoctoral studies at Purdue University and Columbia University, respectively. She became an Assistant Professor at Weill Cornell Medical College in 1997 and was promoted to Professor in 2003. In 2012, Dr. Wu moved to Boston Children’s Hospital as Senior Investigator in the Program in Cellular and Molecular Medicine, and Harvard Medical School as the Asa and Patricia Springer Professor of Biological Chemistry and Molecular Pharmacology. Dr. Wu has received a number of honors, including New York Mayor’s Award for Excellence in Science and Technology, Margaret Dayhoff Memorial Award from the Biophysical Society, Dorothy Crowfoot Hodgkin Award from the Protein Society, Seymour & Vivian Milstein Award from the International Cytokine and Interferon Society, the Bert and Natalie Vallee Award from the American Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, the William B. Coley Award for Distinguished Research in Basic and Cancer Immunology from Cancer Research Institute, AAI-Thermo Fisher Meritorious Career Award from the American Association of Immunologists, and the Gregori Aminoff Prize from the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences. Dr. Wu serves on the Scientific Advisory Council of the Cancer Research Institute and the Editorial Board of Science and Cell. She is an elected member of the National Academy of Sciences, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and the National Academy of Medicine.
- Open to
- Tri-Institutional