Reflections
The Tryptophan Synthase α2β2 Complex: A Model for Substrate Channeling, Allosteric Communication, and Pyridoxal Phosphate Catalysis
I reflect on my research on pyridoxal phosphate (PLP) enzymes over fifty-five years and on how I combined research with marriage and family. My Ph.D. research with Esmond E. Snell established one aspect of PLP enzyme mechanism. My postdoctoral work first with Hans L. Kornberg and then with Alton Meister characterized the structure and function of another PLP enzyme, l-aspartate β-decarboxylase. My independent research at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) since 1966 has focused on the bacterial tryptophan synthase α2β2 complex.Practicing Biochemistry without a License
I grew up in a New Jersey suburb twenty miles east of Manhattan. My passion for science began early in grade school, prompted in part by my father's training in chemical engineering and his work at Union Carbide Corporation during the development of the plastics industry. My first chemistry set and home laboratory were followed by a series of summer jobs in industrial laboratories. My fondest memory was making a ball-and-stick model of the most complicated organic molecule I could find in my chemistry textbook and showing it to my father.Crystallography, Evolution, and the Structure of Viruses
My undergraduate education in mathematics and physics was a good grounding for graduate studies in crystallographic studies of small organic molecules. As a postdoctoral fellow in Minnesota, I learned how to program an early electronic computer for crystallographic calculations. I then joined Max Perutz, excited to use my skills in the determination of the first protein structures. The results were even more fascinating than the development of techniques and provided inspiration for starting my own laboratory at Purdue University.Mrs. Professor
She should be fired —anonymous student evaluation
