CALIXAR as expert in the field of native and functional GPCRs isolation and purification joined the GDR3545 as membership and as sponsor each year since the first annual meeting in 2012. In 2020, CALIXAR is proud to award one of the promising young researchers by the “CALIXAR” Poster Prize 2020.
For the 9th Annual Meeting, the jury had the pleasure of delivering this Prize to Vaithish Velazhahan, a third year PhD student from Chris Tate’s group in the MRC LMB’s Structural Studies Division. He was rewarded and congratulated for his work on the structure of a class D GPCR dimer coupled to two G proteins.
Vaithish Velazhahan has determined the first high-resolution structure of a Class D fungal-specific GPCR Ste2. The cryogenic-electron microscopy snapshot reveals that Ste2 is a homodimer coupled to two G proteins. As the first high-resolution structure of a canonical GPCR dimer that is different from Class C obligate dimers, the structure sheds insight on how GPCR dimerization can occur and provides the template for the design of drugs targeting fungal GPCRs implicated in several intractable fungal diseases.
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