Young researchers received a lecture award for their presentations at the 49th International Symposium on Nucleic Acids Chemistry (ISNAC2022).
Dipanwita Banerjee, Postdoctoral Fellow at the Frontier Institute for Biomolecular Engineering Research (FIBER), has received the Ohtsuka Award (ISNAC Outstanding Oral Presentation Award for Young Scientist 2022) after presenting her research at The 6th Annual Meeting of Japan Society of Nucleic Acids Chemistry・ ISNAC2022 the 49th International Symposium on Nucleic Acids Chemistry.
The Ohtsuka Award is an award for outstanding presentations by young researchers, which was established to honor Dr. Eiko Otsuka (currently Professor Emeritus at Hokkaido University and Honorary Fellow at The National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology) for her outstanding contributions to nucleic acid chemistry in Japan.
In this research, we succeeded for the first time in the world in developing a system to predict the stability of RNA/DNA hybrid structures in an environment similar to that of cells. Using the stability prediction system developed, we could accurately predict the efficiency of CRISPR/Cas9 from the nucleotide sequence. As RNA/DNA hybrids are formed during biological reactions such as transcription and replication, the developed structure prediction system is expected to be utilized in drug discovery, biochemistry, agrochemicals, etc.
In addition, Dr. Kane McQuaid, a young researcher at the University of Reading, as a partner research core in the UK, also received the Ohtsuka Award. Dr. McQuaid conducted collaborative research as a Visiting Researcher at FIBER. The awarded research is based on the experiments conducted during his stay at FIBER, and further progress is expected in the future.
Award-winner：Dipanwita Banerje（Postdoctoral Fellow at Konan University, FIBER）
Title of presentation：New parameters for accurate prediction of RNA/DNA hybrid duplex stability and their advantage in CRISPRCas9 technique
Author(s)：Dipanwita Banerjee1, Hisae Tateishi-Karimata1, Tatsuya Ohyama1, Saptarshi Ghosh1, Tamaki Endoh1, Shuntaro Takahashi1, Naoki Sugimoto1,2
Affiliation：1) Frontier Institute for Biomolecular Engineering Research (FIBER), Konan University, 2) Graduate School of Frontiers of Innovative Research in Science and Technology (FIRST), Konan University
Award-winner：Kane McQuaid（Postdoctoral Researcher at University of Reading in UK）
Title of presentation：Crystallographic studies of ruthenium polypyridyl complexes bound to DNA G-quadruplexes: Towards design, specificity, and function
Author(s)：Kane McQuaid1, David Cardin1, James Hall2, Neil Paterson3, Shuntaro Takahashi4, Naoki Sugimoto4, Christine Cardin1
Affiliation：1) Department of Chemistry, University of Reading, UK., 2) Department of Pharmacy, University of Reading, UK, 3) Diamond Light Source Ltd., Didcot, UK, 4) FIBER, Konan University, Kobe, Japan
●Date：Nov. 2-4, 2022
●International conference venue：Tokyo University of Science, Katsushika Campus
●Organized by The Japan Society of Nucleic Acids Chemistry
