Ruchika Bajaj

University of California San Francisco

Ruchika has a BSc in Biochemistry from the University of Delhi and a MSc in Biotechnology from the Indian Institute of Technology. She obtained her PhD from Purdue University, where she elucidated the catalytic cycle of a binding protein independent mutant, MalG511, from the E.coli maltose transporter in different membrane mimicking media using biochemical and biophysical approaches. She also worked on biochemical characterization of ABC-like protein, FtsEX, and its binding partner, PcsB from S. pneumonia. Ruchika has broad expertise in the expression, purification, reconstitution and characterization of membrane proteins in nanodiscs. Ruchika is now a Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of California San Francisco and is interested in elucidating in mechanistic underpinnings of ABC transporter function using biochemical, biophysical and structural biology, which could help to rationally design novel pharmacological tools to modulate the function of membrane proteins altered in disease.      

Deanna Kroetz

University of California San Francisco

Deanna Kroetz is a Professor in the Department of Bioengineering and Therapeutic Sciences in the School of Pharmacy at the University of California San Francisco. Her research is focused on understanding the mechanisms underlying interindividual variation in drug response and toxicity. Current research efforts include clinical and functional genomics studies of chemotherapy-induced toxicity, and structure-function studies of ABC transporters. Dr. Kroetz received a BS degree magna cum laude in Pharmacy from Ohio State University and her PhD in Pharmaceutics from the University of Washington, under the mentorship of Dr. René Levy. She was a PRAT Fellow in the Laboratory of Molecular Carcinogenesis at the National Cancer Institute under the mentorship of Dr. Frank Gonzalez before joining the faculty at the University of California San Francisco.

Robert M. Stroud

University of California San Francisco

Robert M. Stroud is a Professor of Biochemistry and Biophysics at the University of California San Francisco. He obtained his BA, MA at Cambridge University, and his PhD in J.D. Bernal’s laboratory at London University where he programmed non-centrosymmetric direct methods to determine structure of the nucleoside antibiotic tubercidin, and vitamins. He did his postdoctoral fellowship with R. E. Dickerson, where he determined the first structure of trypsin and trypsinogen. He became an Associate Professor of Chemistry at California Institute of Technology, and moved to UCSF as the founding member of the Macromolecular Structure Group. He is a member of the National Academy of Sciences, a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and a Fellow of the Royal Society of Medicine. Stroud’s research focuses on the mechanisms of transmembrane transporters, receptors and channels, and on the mechanisms of protein-RNA recognition and chemistry, at the level of atomic structure, mechanisms, inhibition, and structure-based drug discovery.