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St. Jude Family of Websites
Explore our cutting edge research, world-class patient care, career opportunities and more.
St. Jude Children's Research Hospital Home
- Fundraising
About the Department
The primary goal of the Department of Structural Biology at St. Jude is to understand life and disease at the atomic level.
We use sophisticated biophysical techniques — such as Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (NMR) spectroscopy, X-ray crystallography, cryo-electron microscopy and tomography, single-molecule imaging, and mass spectrometry — to determine the three-dimensional structures and dynamics of biological macromolecules. These experimental methods are combined with computational and data-science approaches, to provide insight into how macromolecules move, alter their structures and interact with other molecules, in order to carry out their biological functions. Such integrative studies expand our understanding of the most fundamental biological processes and of the diseases that arise when those processes go awry.
Researchers in our department are working to decipher the biophysical principles and molecular details of key cellular processes, including gene expression, subcellular organization, oncogenesis, protein translation, protein folding and misfolding, fatty acid biosynthesis, membrane transport, signaling and cell death. Atomic-level information of proteins and macromolecular complexes provide fundamental insights and can help design new therapeutics, materials and diagnostic tools.
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"Seeing the Invisible in Protein Kinases"
St. Jude Structural Biology has announced a new blue-sky initiative to detect and characterize rare conformational states in protein kinases. Join our team.
Learn about this Blue-Sky Initiative
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Center of Excellence for Data-Driven Discovery
The Center of Excellence for Data-Driven Discovery supports researchers in integrating large, multi-dimensional datasets to uncover new biological insights and testable hypotheses.
Learn about the Center of Excellence
Technology
Core Centers
The Technology Core Centers at the Structural Biology Department provide investigators with access to cutting-edge equipment and methodologies. Each Center is managed by dedicated staff scientists who provide training and support to researchers investigating structure–function of proteins and of macromolecular complexes. With in-house scientific expertise and state-of-the-art facilities, the Centers enable the combination of multiple approaches to tackle challenging biological problems, thus empowering integrative structural biology.
Protein Technologies Center
Director: Ravi Kalathur, PhD
Biomolecular NMR Center
Director: Youlin Xia, PhD
Biomolecular X-Ray Crystallography Center
Director: Darcie Miller, PhD
Cryo-Electron Microscopy Center
Director: Syed Asfarul Haque, PhD
Single-Molecule Imaging Center
Computational Structural Biology Center
(in development)
Cryo-Electron Tomography Center
(in development)
Center of Mass Spectrometry for Structural Biology
(in development)
Research
focus areas
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M. Madan Babu, PhD, FRSC, FMedSci
Chief Data Scientist and Senior Vice President for Data Science
Member, St. Jude Faculty
Director, Center of Excellence for Data-Driven Discovery
Endowed Chair in Biological Data Science
Structural Biology Department
St. Jude Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences
Comprehensive Cancer Center
Research focus:
Understanding life at the molecular level using data science
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Scott Blanchard, PhD
Member, St. Jude Faculty
Single-molecule Imaging Center
Endowed Chair in Molecular Imaging
Structural Biology Department
Chemical Biology & Therapeutics Department
Comprehensive Cancer Center
Research focus:
Understanding structure-function relationships in complex biochemical systems at the single-molecule scale
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Richard W. Kriwacki, PhD
Member, St. Jude Faculty
Co-Leader, Cancer Biology Program
Adjunct Associate Professor, Department of Molecular Sciences, UT Health Science Center, Memphis
Structural Biology Department
Comprehensive Cancer CenterResearch focus:
Exploring the role of phase separation by intrinsically disordered proteins in biological processes and disease mechanisms
Adjunct Faculty
Department team
Charalampos G. Kalodimos, PhD
Chair, Joseph Simone Endowed Chair in Basic Research
Robert Hsu
Sr. Director of Operations
Elisabetta Bini, PhD
Director of Research Operations
Inês Chen, PhD
Director of Scientific & Strategic Operations
Zhaowen Luo, MSc
Scientific Visualization Engineer
Sara Alston
Administrative Director
David Farmer
Sr. Administrative Coordinator
Angela Williams
Administrative Coordinator
Meredith Serna
Administrative Coordinator
Fisseha Moges, MPA
Administrative Coordinator
Blair Nieman
Manager Research Administration
Join us
St. Jude investigators have the freedom to focus on making big discoveries, backed by extraordinary resources and support teams. We are always looking for highly motivated scientists and engineers with passion and talent to join us!
Contact us
Structural Biology MS311
St. Jude Children's Research Hospital
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