Elizabeth D. Getzoff, PhD
Professor Emeritus
Department of Integrative Structural and Computational Biology
Research Focus
We study functionally important protein conformational changes pertinent to protein recognition, interaction and catalysis to provide a detailed understanding of how proteins work. Major research areas include protein photosensing, enzymatic control of reactive oxygen species, the coupling of metal-site chemistry and electron transfer for catalysis, and metalloprotein design. We use multi-wavelength anomalous diffraction; time resolved Laue crystallography; ultra high-resolution protein crystallography; freeze trapping; femtosecond and nanosecond laser initiation; rapid single-crystal spectroscopy computational and computer graphics analysis; and protein design cycles to test and integrate results from x-ray crystallography, molecular biology, biochemistry, and spectroscopy.