K-State Biochemist Jianhan Chen Uses Computer Modeling to Study Protein Involved with Cancer

Wednesday April 13, 2011

BIOCHEMIST USES COMPUTER MODELING TO STUDY PROTEIN INVOLVED WITHCANCER, AGING AND CHRONIC DISEASE

A new biophysical and biochemical study may lead to better understanding of how structural flexibility controls the interaction of a protein that is closely involved with cancer, aging and other chronic diseases—thereby facilitating future development of better therapeutic strategies, according to a Kansas State University biochemist.

Jianhan Chen, an assistant professor of biochemistry, was one of the researchers on a collaborative project that took a combined computational and experimental approach to understand how protein p21 functions as a versatile regulator of cell division. Their latest findings, “Intrinsic disorder mediates the diverse regulatory functions of the Cdk inhibitor p21,” were published in a recent edition of Nature Chemical Biology.

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