Latest News for 07/2022
January 2021
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19 Jan 2021
Sarah Coulthurst, Gopal Sapkota and Satpal Virdee have been promoted to Personal Chair (Professor) as part of the 2020 Annual Review process for academic staff. Sarah Coulthurst will become Professor of Microbial Interactions, Gopal Sapkota will become Professor of Disease Signalling and Satpal Virdee will become Professor of Chemical Biology.
August 2020
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03 Aug 2020
The three-year alliance will allow knowledge, skills and technology sharing, as well as two joint postdoctoral positions, in order to accelerate discoveries on molecular metabolic signalling in control of glucose homeostasis We are proud to announce the launch of an International Research Alliance between the Medical Research Council Phosphorylation and Ubiquitylation Unit (MRC PPU), at the University of Dundee, and the Novo Nordisk Foundation Center for Basic Metabolic Research (CBMR), at the University of Copenhagen.
July 2020
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15 Jul 2020
University of Dundee researchers have demonstrated a new method of destroying an ‘undruggable’ protein known to play a role in cancer, raising the possibility of a new therapeutic approach to the disease. Mutations of the K-Ras protein have long been known to cause many cancers, including lung, colorectal, and pancreatic cancers, but despite decades of work by researchers across the world, an inhibitor for this protein has proven elusive. As a result, scientists have increasingly looked to novel ways of targeting K-Ras.
July 2019
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31 Jul 2019
Researchers in the Medical Research Council Protein Phosphorylation and Ubiquitylation Unit (MRC PPU) have solved one of the mysteries of cell division, a discovery which may shed light on cancer development and one day help develop new drugs to treat the disease.
November 2018
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06 Nov 2018
PhD students from the MRC PPU took part in the Biotechnology YES 2018 entrepreneurial competition last week. Luke Fulcher (Sapkota lab), Lambert Montava Garriga (Ganley lab), Maria Zachari (Ganley lab) and Marianna Longo (Ganley lab) formed the team “AllerTek” which sought to combat the presence of food allergens in meals. The biotechnology YES competition allows PhD students from across the UK to compete against each other with their ideas in a “dragons den” style pitch to secure theoretical funding for their innovation.
March 2018
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23 Mar 2018
Researchers from the University of Dundee and the Francis Crick Institute have made a significant discovery about a cellular pathway associated with developmental defects and a myriad of diseases ranging from alopecia to colorectal cancer.
July 2017
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03 Jul 2017
Research by Rosalia Fernandez-Alonso, a post-doctoral investigator in Dr. Greg Findlay’s lab in the MRC-PPU, has been published in and featured on the cover of the July edition of the journal EMBO Reports. The paper identifies a new type of molecular switch involving BET bromodomain proteins, which enables embryonic stem (ES) cells to differentiate into mesendoderm, an important precursor cell that gives rise to tissues and organs such as pancreas, liver, heart and blood.
May 2017
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10 May 2017
University of Dundee researchers have shown that it is possible to rapidly target and destroy specific proteins in cells, raising the possibility of developing new ways of targeting ‘undruggable’ proteins in diseases.
November 2013
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CLS researchers strengthen links with scientists at the National Centre for Biological Sciences (...20 Nov 2013
Collaboration between life sciences research in Dundee and India was consolidated last week (11-16 November 2013) by a team of CLS Principal Investigators who visited the National Centre for Biological Sciences (NCBS) and the Institute for Stem Cell Biology and Regenerative Medicine (inStem) in Bangalore to explore mutual scientific interests and future projects.
October 2013
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Sapkota Lab PhD student, Lina Herhaus, publishes paper on the role of OTUB1 in TGFβ signalling in...01 Oct 2013
The TGFβ signalling pathway controls plethora of cellular functions during embryogenesis and in adult tissues. Consequently abnormal TGFβ signalling is associated with multiple human diseases such as fibrosis, immune disorders and cancer. TGFβ signalling is initiated upon ligand binding to a pair of receptor serine/threonine protein kinases on the cell surface. This triggers the phosphorylation of SMAD2/3 leading to the assembly and nuclear translocation of active SMAD2/3/4 transcriptional complex, which, together with other co-factors, drives the transcription of hundreds of target genes.