The Baenziger lab put on another fun show at the BMI/CMM Halloween costume contest, taking first place for a second year in a row, this time as Shrek! Everyone looked fantastic and did a great job getting into character, but to give credit where credit is due, the real MVP was the original resident of the swamp. Tough as nails, and the first character we see in the first scene in Shrek itself ….the outhouse door!
No pressure for next year…
The Baenziger lab came through again with a high-end, original and totally professionally made group costume, to take the win at the BMI group costume category on Halloween.
In the next few months we’ll be seeing Mack, Anna, and Dr Baenziger head off for various temporary stays in France. Anna will sharpen her computational skills, while Mack and Dr B (on a skill-sharpening sabbatical) will work on cryo-EM structures of the nAChR.
Camille successfully defended her thesis during the pandemic, but was finally able to celebrate at summer convocation, not just as a graduate, but as valedictorian and winner of the Governor General’s gold medal! The real achievement was uOttawa’s, for actually getting her to attend convocation.
Big congrats to Mack, whose third author work on this paper has helped our lab break into the big workd of Cryo-EM structures and analysis, which is a new and very exciting field for us!
The paper uses cryo-EM to solve apo and agonist-bound structures of the Torpedo nicotinic receptor embedded in a lipid nanodisc, which gives an unprecedented “before and after” look at the nAChR in a lipid membrane!
Congratulations to Camille on her new first author paper. “A lipid site shapes the agonist response of a pentameric ligand-gated ion channel” is now published in Nature Chemical Biology!
The paper looks into the role of a potential lipid binding site in the functional modulation as well as the desensitization of pentameric ligand-gated ion channels.
Congratulations are due to Daniel Therien and Jiayin Sun who successfully defended their MSc theses (in rapid succession!). It has been a pleasure to have both of these wonderful people in the lab. Jiayin will be beginning Med school in Syracuse NY, while Daniel has chosen to continue his studies with a PhD at McGill in Mtl. Best of luck to both!
The lastest in a growing line of Baenziger lab prize winners, Jiayin Sun took home 2nd place in the BMI poster day, MSc Biochem!
We’re pleased to welcome Dr B back from his trip to Costa Rica – sometimes you just have to let your hair down….so to speak… and unwind.
Dr B riding the waves. Nope, not photoshopped.
We have a winner! We are very proud of Claire Edrington, who won first place in the biochemistry poster day, protein structure and function catergory!