Libich Lab
David S. Libich, PhD
St. Baldrick’s Foundation Scholar
Rank: Assistant Professor
Department: Biochemistry & Structural Biology
Office: Greehey CCRI: 4.100.22 / RAB: 5.206.2
Tel: 210-562-9151 | 210-450-8326
libich@uthscsa.edu
Lab Research
Protein interactions mediate all cellular functions, activities, and communications. Despite their crucial importance, we know relatively little about many of these interactions due in large part to experimental limitations of structural biology. The central theme of my lab revolves around the determination of the structure and elucidation of the molecular mechanisms of highly dynamic and transient protein interactions. Our current efforts are focused on understanding the assembly and functional interactions of the low-complexity domains of RNA-binding proteins involved in cancer and neurodegenerative processes. In particular, we are interested in the oncogenic fusion protein EWS-Fli1 and the structural implications of its role as the sole driver of Ewing’s sarcoma. These types of proteins are challenging targets for biophysical characterization due to their extreme structural heterogeneity and propensity to aggregate.
Lab Staff
Victoria Alers (co-advised with Dr. Penalva)
Student
Antoine Baudin, PhD
Postdoctoral Fellow
Hoang Dinh
Research Assistant
Courtney Johnson
Graduate Research Assistant
Emily Lancaster, PhD.
Postdoctoral Fellow
George Parra
Graduate Research Assistant
Greehey Graduate Fellowship
TL1 translational science fellowship
Emily Selig, PhD
Postdoctoral Fellow
Erich Sohn
Graduate Student
Xiaoping Xu
Research Scientist
Featured News
Emily Selig of Libich Lab, Awarded a Spot on CPRIT Training Grant
KENS5: UT Health gets a $306,000 grant to study Ewing sarcoma
- Biomolecules: Enhancing the Conformational Stability of the cl-Par-4 Tumor Suppressor via Site-Directed Mutagenesis (Libich Lab) May 17, 2023
- Biopolymers: Biochemical and biophysical characterization of the nucleic acid binding properties of the RNA/DNA binding protein EWS March 21, 2023
- BioPhysics Journal: Unraveling the phase separation of EWS low complexity domain using molecular dynamics simulations (Libich Lab) March 3, 2023