26 July 2011

Dario Alessi to direct MRC Protein Phosphorylation Unit in Dundee

An award-winning scientist, Professor Dario Alessi FRS, has been appointed director of the Medical Research Council's (MRC) Protein Phosphorylation Unit at the University of Dundee. He will succeed the current director, Professor Sir Philip Cohen, who will step down in April 2012.

The MRC Protein Phosphorylation Unit is the only research unit in the world dedicated to the study of protein phosphorylation, a versatile process that regulates almost all aspects of cell life. Abnormalities in protein phosphorylation are a cause of many diseases including cancer, diabetes, high blood pressure, rheumatoid arthritis and Parkinson's disease.

Professor Alessi is currently deputy director of the MRC Protein Phosphorylation Unit and also Professor of Signal Transductionin the College of Life Sciences at the University of Dundee. His research career spans over 20 years and his appointment as director is testament to his pioneering research in this field.

In 2005 Professor Alessi was awarded the EMBO Gold Medal, Europe's most prestigious research prize for life scientists under the age of 40. He was also invited to deliver the venerated Francis Crick Prize Lecture of the Royal Society in 2006 and elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in 2008.

Drugs that treat abnormally high levels of phosphorylation are currently having a major impact on the treatment of cancer and over 50 per cent of the pharmaceutical industry's research and development budget is spent on this topic. The MRC Protein Phosphorylation Unit plays a major role in drug discovery and development through a long-standing collaboration with five of the world's major pharmaceutical companies. This partnership, called the Division of Signal Transduction Therapy, has become a model for effective collaboration between academia and industry.

Under Professor Alessi's direction, the unit's future remit will be expanded to study the role of an emerging form of cell biology called ubiquitylation. Early research suggests that ubiquitylation rivals phosphorylation in its global importance for wider scientific understanding. There is great expectation that better knowledge of ubiquitylation and its relationship with phosphorylation could hold the key to determining the causes of many diseases and couldlead to the development of new classes of medicine.

Speaking about his appointment, Professor Alessi said: "It is a tremendous privilege to take over the helm of the MRC Protein Phosphorylation Unit from Sir Philip Cohen. Sir Philip will be a hard act to follow, but I am looking forward to the extraordinary opportunities that lie ahead.

"This is an exhilarating time in phosphorylation and ubiquitylation research and my main aim will be to position the unit as a focal point for collaboration between life scientists, pharmaceutical companies and clinicians. It is my strong belief that this is where we can make the most critical contribution to medical research, together reaching a deeper understanding of disease and developing more effective treatments."

Speaking in support of Professor Alessi's appointment, MRC Chief Executive Sir John Savill said:

"I am delighted that Professor Alessi has been appointed as director of the MRC Protein Phosphorylation Unit. Professor Alessi is an exceptional scientist having made significant contributions to our understanding of the role of protein phosphorylation in cell regulation and human disease. Under his direction I feel confident that he will build on the unit's world-leading reputation and excellent track record, ensuring that it remains at theforefront of medical research."

Notes to Editors

For further information and to arrange an interview please contact Leanne McCormick, MRC Regional Communications Manager- Scotland on 07775 030 882 or email leanne.mccormick@hgu.mrc.ac.uk.

Professor Alessi's biography
Professor Dario Alessi was born in France, attended high school in Brussels and obtained a BSc in Biochemistry from the University of Birmingham in 1988. He received a PhD in 1991 for work on the synthesis and use of spin-labelled ATP analogues to study muscle contraction under the joint supervision of Ian Trayer (University of Birmingham) and David Trentham FRS (MRC National Institute of Medical Research, Mill Hill, London).

From 1991 to 1997 he carried out postdoctoral research with Sir Philip Cohen FRS in the Medical Research Council's Protein Phosphorylation Unit inDundee, where he became fascinated by protein kinases and how they are regulated by insulin, growth factors and other extracellular signals that control almost all aspects of cell biology.

In 1998 Professor Alessi became a Programme Leader at the MRC Protein Phosphorylation Unit, where he has worked ever since. A key focus of his current research is to understand the regulation and physiological roles of key protein kinases that are implicated in human disease and to exploit findings emerging from these studies in the development of new treatments for disease.

Selected career achievements:

1. Identified ERK1 and ERK2 as the physiological substrates for the CL100/MKP tyrosine phosphatases (1993)
2. Described the mechanism by which PKB/Akt is activated by phosphorylation of Thr308 and Ser473 (1996)
3. Discovered and characterised the PDK1 protein kinase that phosphorylates PKB/Akt at Thr308 (1997)
4. Characterised the mechanism by which PDK1 is regulated and showed that it also activates ~20 other AGC family kinases related to PKB/Akt (1998-2002)
5. Discovered the MSK1 and MSK2 protein kinases that are activated by mitogen and stress-activated signalling pathways (1998)
6. Discovered the activation mechanism of the LKB1 tumour suppressor protein kinase by demonstrating that it exists in a complex with STRAD and MO25 (2003) and solved the structure of this complex in collaboration with Daan van Aalten (2010). Demonstrated that MO25 functions as a master regulator of many STE20 kinases (2011)
7. Discovered that LKB1 phosphorylates and activates AMPK as well as 12 other protein kinases related to AMPK (2003-2004)
8. Identified the SPAK/OSR1 physiological substrates of the WNK1 and WNK4 protein kinases that are mutated in humans with Gordon's hypertension syndrome (2005)
9. Identified and validated the mechanism by which SPAK/OSR1 may regulate blood pressure by controlling the activity of NCC and NKCC2 ion co-transporters (2007-2010)
10. Developed technologies that are enabling MRC Technology, as well as several pharmaceutical companies, to develop inhibitors against LRRK2 that may be useful in the treatment of Parkinson's disease. In collaboration with Nathanael Gray, helped characterise the highly specific LRRK2-IN1 inhibitor tool compound (2007-2011)

Current other responsibilities

• Co-director (with Philip Cohen and Pete Downes) of the Dundee Signal Transduction Therapy Unit
• Vice Chair of Europe for the Biochemical Journal
• Senior Editor of EMBO Molecular Medicine
• Editorial Board member of the EMBO Journal, EMBO Reports, Journal of Cell Science and Molecular and Cellular Biology
• Scientific Advisory Board: MRC Clinical Sciences Centre; Hammersmith Hospital London, Max Planck Institute for Molecular Physiology in Dortmund and the Institut de RecercaBiomedicaBarcelona
• Jury member on the annual 400,000 Euro BBVA Foundation Frontiers Of Knowledge Award In Biomedicine
• Chair of the Royal Society Newton Fellowships Committee in Biology

Awards and Honours

• 1999 Colworth Medal of the Biochemical Society
• 2000 The Eppendorf Young European Investigator Award
• 2002 Elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh
• 2002 Morgagni Young Investigator Prize
• 2002 Royal Society of Edinburgh Makdougall Brisbane Prize
• 2002 Philip Leverhulme Prize
• 2003 FEBS Anniversary Prize of the GesellschaftfürBiochemie und Molekularbiologie
• 2004 RD Lawrence Lecture of Diabetes UK
• 2005 Elected a Member of EMBO
• 2005 Awarded the EMBO Gold Medal
• 2006 Francis Crick Prize Lecture of The Royal Society
• 2008 Elected a Fellow of The Royal Society

About the Medical Research Council's Protein Phosphorylation Unit
The unit's major aims are to advance understanding of the role of protein phosphorylation in cell regulation and human disease, to facilitate the development of drugs to treat diseases caused by abnormalities in this process, to generate reagents and improve technologies that will drive more rapid progress in this area, and to train the next generation of scientists who will advance our understanding of the subject.

The unit's innovative collaboration with a number of major pharmaceutical companies has become a model for how academic scientists can interact with industry, for which it won the UK's Queen Anniversary Prize in 2006.

About the Medical Research Council
For almost 100 years the Medical Research Council has improved the health of people in the UK and around the world by supporting the highest quality science. The MRC invests in world-class scientists. It has produced 29 Nobel Prize winners and sustains a flourishing environment for internationally recognised research. The MRC focuses on making an impact and provides the financial muscle and scientific expertise behind medical breakthroughs, including one of the first antibiotics penicillin, the structure of DNA and the lethal link between smoking and cancer. Today MRC funded scientists tackle research into the major health challenges of the 21st century. www.mrc.ac.uk.

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