ABOUT THE WCPCW
The West Coast Protein Crystallography Workshop (WCPCW), a biennial event,
has grown in prominence and attendance since its inception about 40 years ago.
It has become a pre-eminent venue for the presentation of useful structure
information and developing techniques in the field of macromolecular crystallography.
The 250+ conferees include graduate students, postdoctoral fellows,
senior faculty, and delegates from West Coast laboratories. Increasingly,
crystallographers from other regions, both domestic and foreign, have
participated as well. This Conference preserves its workshop character
allowing for the productive interaction of all the participants.
A notable feature of the WCPCW is a schedule dominated with oral presentations
by students, postdocs, and those who have been closely associated with
the execution of the research presented. This allows for an impressive
array of talks on exciting topics by rising stars. We anticipate an exciting
schedule featuring outstanding science coupled with a unique collaborating
opportunity for all members of the crystallographer community.
KEYNOTE SPEAKERS
 Brian
W. Matthews is a Professor of Physics at the University of
Oregon. He was born in Melbourne, Australia and received his graduate
training in small molecule crystallography at the University of Adelaide.
He did postdoctoral research in protein crystallography with David
Blow at the MRC-LMB in Cambridge, England, where he worked on the structure
of α-chymotrypsin and protein phase determination, and later at the
National Institutes of Health with David Davies, where he worked on
the γ-chymotrypsin isoform structure and antibodies. In 1969, he opened
his laboratory at the University of Oregon in Eugene where he has been
a Professor of Physics and a founding member of the Institute of Molecular
Biology. During the 1970s and early 1980s, his lab solved many new
structures, thermolysin protease, λ-cro repressor, T4 lysozyme and
bacterial chlorophyll, to name a few. In the early 1980s, Brian’s
lab began probing structure-stability relationships in T4 lysozyme,
which became a signature work for the group. In addition, numerous
other publications on wide variety of topics have emanated from the
lab: DNA-binding proteins and enzymes, aminopeptidases, glycosidases,
occupancy of internal cavities, structural effects of cryo-cooling
and so forth. He has been the recipient of numerous grants, awards
and honors throughout his research career, with well over 300 publications,
and more than 500 structures in the PDB. From 1990 until his retirement
from research in summer 2008, Brian was a Howard Hughes Investigator.
He is also a member of the National Academy of Sciences and past president
of the Protein Society. He continues to be active in the crystallographic
community, and is an ex-officio officer for the Protein Society and
Editor-in-Chief of Protein Science.
 Florante A. Quiocho is the Charles C. Bell Professor of Structural Biology
and Professor of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology at the Baylor College
of Medicine. He was born in the Philippines. He received his Ph.D. degree
in Biochemistry from Yale University, where he worked with Frederic M.
Richards in obtaining pivotal evidence for the catalytic activities of
enzymes in the crystalline state. Following a postdoctoral appointment
at Harvard University, conducting research in protein crystallography
with William N. Lipscomb, Dr. Quiocho joined the faculty of the Department
of Biochemistry at Rice University until moving on to Baylor where he
also held a HHMI Investigator appointment for 18 years. Dr. Quiocho has
been the recipient of fellowships from the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial
Foundation and EMBO. His research interests center on the relationship
of the three-dimensional structures and functions of several proteins.
These studies have yielded new insights into understanding of molecular
recognitions of ions by ion-dipole interactions, carbohydrates by aromatic
residue stacking and capped RNA by cation-π interaction, calmodulin-regulated
signal transduction processes, ABC-type active transport and enzyme catalysis.
Current studies of the Quiocho group focus mainly on membrane fusion/secretion
and vesicular trafficking.
CONFERENCE ORGANIZERS
Enoch P. Baldwin, Ph.D.
Department of Molecular and Cellular Biology
University of California, Davis
Andrew J. Fisher, Ph.D.
Department of Chemistry
University of California, Davis
David K. Wilson, Ph.D.
Department of Molecular and Cellular Biology
University of California, Davis
[ back to top ] |
