News and Events | Department of Biochemistry

New Technique Allows Scientists to See Proteins Moving as They Work

August 12, 2021

Researchers at Weill Cornell Medicine have shown that they can record the high-speed motions of proteins while correlating their motion to function. The feat should allow scientists to study proteins in greater detail than ever before, and in principle enables the development of drugs that work better by hitting their protein targets much more effectively.

The researchers, in a study published July 16 in Nature...

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Elegant Solution: Endocrinology Chief Dr. Laura Alonso—A Specialist in Diabetes Research and Treatment—is Exploring Ways to Restore the Body’s Insulin Production

September 2, 2020

The daughter of two nuclear physicists, Dr. Laura Alonso, was drawn to medicine while earning her undergrad degree in biochemistry from Harvard. She attended the University of Pennsylvania’s Perelman School of Medicine, followed by an internal medicine residency at the University of Chicago and fellowships in endocrinology and metabolism there and at New York University. Last September, she became chief of the Division of Endocrinology, Diabetes, and Metabolism at Weill Cornell Medicine...

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Overcoming the Odds: Dr. Bishoy Faltas Works to Develop More Effective Therapies for Bladder Cancer

August 19, 2020

By Emily Smith
Each year, 80,000 people in the United States are newly diagnosed with bladder cancer, and more than 17,000 lose their lives due to the disease. It ranks as the fourth most common type of cancer in men—but for decades, there was a paucity of research and little understanding of its unique biology, leaving clinicians with limited treatment options.
Dr. Bishoy Faltas, is changing that. An assistant professor of...

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Pluripotent Stem Cells Shed Light on How COVID-19 Infects the Pancreas and Liver and Its Relationship with Diabetes

July 23, 2020

The study of human pluripotent stem cells, which can develop into any cell type in the body, is providing Weill Cornell Medicine and NewYork-Presbyterian investigators with new insights into the virus that causes COVID-19 and how it may infect organs such as the pancreas and liver.
The study, published June 19 in Cell Stem Cell, demonstrates that the severe acute...

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New "Photoswitchable Ligand" Technique Allows Detailed Study of Neural Receptors

November 26, 2019

A new technology developed by Weill Cornell Medicine and Max Planck Institute for Medical Research scientists allows the controlled, on-and-off “switching” of neural receptors with unprecedented efficiency and precision. The technology is likely to be widely adopted for studying these receptors and their links to behavior, and potentially will enable the development of better drugs for treating depression,...

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Scientists Identify Protein that Promotes Brain Metastasis

November 4, 2019

A protein that breast, lung and other cancers use to promote their spread—or metastasis—to the brain, has been identified by a team led by Weill Cornell Medicine and New York-Presbyterian investigators. The protein, CEMIP, will now be a focus of efforts to predict, prevent and treat brain metastases, which are a frequent cause of cancer deaths.
In their study, published Nov. 4 in Nature Cell Biology, the scientists found...

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Researchers Uncover Pathways Leading to Heart Defects in Genetic Syndrome

July 11, 2019

Two molecular signaling pathways underlie the cardiac defects associated with one type of the inherited disorder Noonan syndrome (NS), researchers from Masonic Medical Research Institute, Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and Weill Cornell Medicine find in a new study. The investigators built the first patient-derived stem cell model of the RAF1 mutant form of NS to investigate the defect, a severe thickening of the...

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Enzyme Digests Amyloid-Beta Associated with Alzheimer’s Disease

January 29, 2018

An enzyme found in brain cells can break apart the precursors to plaques that accumulate in the organ and cause toxicity in Alzheimer’s disease, according to a new study led by Weill Cornell Medicine scientists.
The study, published Jan. 29 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, illuminates where the enzyme, tripeptidyl peptidase 1 (TPP1), cuts these plaque precursors—formed by peptide fragments...

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Biochemistry Post-Doc Honored with 2017 Tri-Institutional Breakout Award

May 5, 2017

Dr. Ghazaleh Ashrafi, a postdoctoral associate in biochemistry at Weill Cornell Medicine, has won a 2017 Tri-Institutional Breakout Award for Junior Investigators.
The awards, which honor outstanding postdoctoral investigators at Weill Cornell Medicine, Memorial Sloan Kettering and The Rockefeller University, are given annually to up to six promising postdoctoral trainees based on their research accomplishments, the impact...

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Researchers Discover New Mechanism of Synapse Control

March 10, 2017

A tiny tubular structure directly controls synapses, the junctions through which communication signals flow between nerve cells, according to a paper published Feb. 8 in Neuron. The research could eventually help scientists better understand and treat a variety of neurological diseases, including spastic paraplegia, which leads to stiffness, weakness and spasms in the legs, and amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), the...

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