Margaret Johnson, Ph.D

maggie@scripps.edu

phone: +1 858 784 8356  
fax     : +1 858 784 8014 

Research Interests

My research focuses on studies of protein structure and dynamics and protein-ligand interactions by solution NMR spectroscopy, and more generally, the structural biology and structural genomics of biomedically-relevant proteins.

Curriculum Vitae

Education  

1997–2003 Ph.D. in Biochemistry, Simon Fraser University, Burnaby, Canada

Advisor: Dr. B. Mario Pinto

Thesis: "The Nature and Origin of Carbohydrate Mimicry"

1992–1997 B.Sc. in Biochemistry (Minor in Chemistry), Simon Fraser University, Burnaby, Canada

Research Experience

 2003–present Postdoctoral Research,The Scripps Research Institute

Department of Molecular Biology and Joint Center for Structural Genomics

Advisor: Dr. Kurt Wüthrich

Research focus: Protein structure and function, biomolecular NMR spectroscopy, structural genomics

1997–2003 Ph.D. Research, Simon Fraser University

Department of Molecular Biology and Biochemistry

Advisor: Dr. B. Mario Pinto

Research focus: Peptide-carbohydrate mimicry, NMR spectroscopy for the conformational analysis of protein-bound ligands

Awards and Honours

Postdoctoral

2007 Boehringer Ingelheim Award of the Canadian Society for Chemistry

2003–2006 Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR) Postdoctoral Fellowship

2003–2005 Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council (NSERC) Postdoctoral Fellowship (declined)

Graduate

2003 Governor General’s Gold Medal for academic excellence in a graduate thesis

2002 Macmillan-Bloedel Graduate Scholarship

Simon Fraser University Graduate Fellowship

President's Ph.D. Research Stipend

Sulzer Pumps Inc. Graduate Scholarship

1997–2001 NSERC Postgraduate Scholarship

1999–2001 Hemingway Nelson Architects Graduate Scholarship

2001 Department of Chemistry Graduate Poster Competition Award

2000 Sulzer Pumps Inc. Graduate Scholarship

1999 Petro-Canada Graduate Scholarship in Science

1997 Special Graduate Entrance Scholarship

Undergraduate

1996–1997 Simon Fraser University Open Scholarship

1996 NSERC Industrial Undergraduate Student Research Award

1994 NSERC Undergraduate Student Research Award (1994)

Publications

1. Flückiger JP, Masson P, Johnson MA, Jones TR, Rodger IW. Mucin secretion and mucociliary clearance are regulated by integrated processes in the tracheobronchial tree of conscious guinea pigs. (Abstract) Am. J. Respiratory Critical Care Med.1995, 151, 4, A815.

  2. Cornell RB, Kalmar GB, Kay RJ, Johnson MA, Sanghera JS, Pelech SL. Functions of the C-terminal domain of CTP:phosphocholine cytidylyltransferase. Biochem. J.1995, 310, 699–708.

3. Randell KD, Frandsen TP, Stoffer B, Johnson MA, Svensson B, Pinto BM. Synthesis and glycosidase inhibitory activity of 5-thioglucopyranosylamines. Molecular modeling of complexes with glucoamylase. Carbohydr. Res. 1999, 321, 143–156.

4. Johnson MA, Rotondo A, Pinto BM. NMR studies of the antibody-bound conformation of a carbohydrate-mimetic peptide. Biochemistry2002, 41, 2149–2157.

5. Johnson MA, Pinto BM. Molecular mimicry of carbohydrates by peptides. Aust. J. Chem. 2002, 55, 13–25. (Special Issue for the 21 st International Carbohydrate Symposium).

6. Vyas NK, Vyas MN, Chervenak MC, Johnson MA, Pinto BM, Bundle DR, Quiocho FA. Molecular recognition of oligosaccharide epitopes by a monoclonal Fab specific for Shigella flexneri Y lipopolysaccharide: X-ray structures and thermodynamics. Biochemistry 2002, 41, 13575–13586.

7. Johnson MA, Pinto BM. Saturation transfer difference 1D-TOCSY experiments to map the topography of oligosaccharides recognized by a monoclonal antibody directed against the cell-wall polysaccharide of group A Streptococcus. J. Am. Chem. Soc. 2002, 124, 15368–15374

8. Johnson MA, Eniade AA, Pinto BM. Rational design and synthesis of peptide ligands for an anti-carbohydrate antibody and their immunochemical characterization. Bioorg. Med. Chem. 2003, 11, 781–788.

9. Johnson MA, Höög C, Pinto BM. A novel modeling protocol for protein receptors guided by bound-ligand conformation. Biochemistry 2003, 42, 1842–1853.

10. Johnson MA, Jensen MT, Svensson B, Pinto BM. Selection of a high-energy bioactive conformation of a sulfonium-ion glycosidase inhibitor by the enzyme glucoamylase G2. J. Am. Chem. Soc. 2003, 125, 5663–5670.

11. Johnson MA, Jaseja M, Zou W, Jennings HJ, Copié V, Pinto BM, Pincus SH. NMR studies of carbohydrates and carbohydrate-mimetic peptides recognized by an anti-group B Streptococcus antibody. J. Biol. Chem. 2003, 278, 24740–24752.

12. Honson N, Johnson MA, Oliver JE, Prestwich GD, Plettner E. Structure activity studies with pheromone-binding proteins of the gypsy moth, Lymantria dispar. Chem. Senses 2003, 28, 479–489.

13. Hossany RB, Johnson MA, Eniade AA, Pinto BM. Synthesis and immunochemical characterization of protein conjugates of carbohydrate and carbohydrate-mimetic peptides as experimental vaccines. Bioorg. Med. Chem. 2004, 12, 3743–3754.

14. Johnson MA, Pinto BM. Saturation-transfer difference NMR studies for the epitope mapping of a carbohydrate-mimetic peptide recognized by an anti-carbohydrate antibody. Bioorg. Med. Chem. 2004, 12, 295–300.

15. Johnson MA, Pinto BM. NMR spectroscopic and molecular modeling studies of protein-carbohydrate and protein-peptide interactions. Carbohydr. Res. 2004, 339, 907–928.

16. Michon F, Moore SL, Kim J, Blake MS, Auzanneau FI, Johnston BD, Johnson MA, Pinto BM. Doubly branched hexasaccharide epitope on the cell wall polysaccharide of group A streptococci recognized by human and rabbit antisera. Infect Immun. 2005, 73, 6383–6389.

17. Peti W, Johnson MA, Herrmann T, Neuman BW, Buchmeier MJ, Nelson M, Joseph J, Page R, Stevens RC, Kuhn P, Wüthrich K. Structural genomics of the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus: nuclear magnetic resonance structure of the protein nsP7. J. Virol. 2005, 79, 12905–12913.

18. Johnson MA, Peti W, Herrmann T, Wilson IA, Wüthrich K. Solution structure of Asl1650, an acyl carrier protein from Anabaena sp. PCC 7120 with a variant phosphopantetheinylation-site sequence. Protein Sci. 2006, 15, 1030–1041.

19. Serrano P, Almeida MS, Johnson MA, Wüthrich K. NMR assignment of the protein nsp3a from SARS-CoV. J. Biomol. NMR2006, 36 (Suppl. 1), 45.

20. Almeida MS, Johnson MA, Wüthrich K. NMR assignment of the SARS-CoV protein nsp1. J. Biomol. NMR2006, 36 (Suppl. 1), 46.

21. Almeida MS, Johnson MA, Herrmann T, Geralt M, Wüthrich K. Novel β-barrel fold in the NMR structure of the replicase nonstructural protein 1 from the SARS coronavirus. J. Virol. 2007, 81, 3151–3161.

22. Johnson MA , Southworth MW, Perler FB, Wüthrich K. NMR assignment of a KlbA intein precursor from Methanococcus jannaschii. Biomol. NMR Assign. 2007, 1, 19–21.

23. Serrano P, Johnson MA, Almeida MS, Horst R, Herrmann T, Joseph JS, Neuman BW, Subramanian V, Saikatendu KS, Buchmeier MJ, Stevens RC, Kuhn P, Wüthrich K. NMR structure of the N-terminal domain of the nonstructural protein 3 from the SARS coronavirus. J. Virol.2007, 81, 12049–12060.

24. Johnson MA , Southworth MW, Herrmann T, Brace L, Perler FB, Wüthrich K. NMR structure of a KlbA intein precursor from Methanococcus jannaschii. Protein Sci.2007, 16, 1316–1328.

25. Chatterjee A, Johnson MA, Serrano P, Pedrini B, Wüthrich K. NMR assignment of the domain 513–651 from the SARS-CoV nonstructural protein nsp3. Biomol. NMR Assign., in press.

26. Johnson MA, Pinto BM. Structural and functional studies of peptide-carbohydrate mimicry. Top. Curr. Chem.2008, 273 (Bioactive Conformations II), T. Peters, Ed. Springer-Verlag, in press.