Ann McDermott
Ann McDermott’s research program at Columbia University aims to understand the remarkable ability of proteins to catalyze chemical reactions and participate in signaling cascades. She has developed and applied magnetic resonance methods to probe the structure, flexibility and function of proteins. Her group investigates allosteric regulation and timing of potassium ion channels, which play crucial roles in diverse contexts, from bacteria to the human nervous system. Her research group has determined the structures and characterized the dynamics of amyloids whose formation is a critical step in cellular signaling in humans. She discovered and characterized a novel polarization (NMR signal enhancement) mechanism associated with the photochemical reactions in the photosynthetic reaction center. On the basis of this research, she is the recipient of the Pure Award in Chemistry (1996) and the Eastern Analytic Symposium Award for Achievement in Magnetic Resonance (2005), and she is an elected member of both the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and the National Academy of Sciences. Ann has a B. Sc. in Chemistry from Harvey Mudd College, where she carried out research in physical organic chemistry with Philip Myhre, and a Ph. D. in Chemistry from U. C. Berkeley, where she worked with Kenneth Sauer and Melvin Klein, carrying out spectroscopic studies of the photosynthetic reaction centers of green plants. She carried out postgraduate work at MIT with Dr. Robert Griffin studying Nuclear Magnetic Resonance, and at the Tropical Medicine Institute of the ULB in Brussels, Belgium, studying drug targets in Trypanosomes. She has been on the faculty of Columbia University since 1991.
Abstracts this author is presenting: