Guy Salvesen is a South African-born

biochemist Biochemists are scientists who are trained in biochemistry. They study chemical processes and chemical transformations in living organisms. Biochemists study DNA, proteins and Cell (biology), cell parts. The word "biochemist" is a portmanteau of ...

, best known for his work in the field of

apoptosis Apoptosis (from grc, ἀπόπτωσις, apóptōsis, 'falling off') is a form of programmed cell death that occurs in multicellular organisms. Biochemical events lead to characteristic cell changes (morphology) and death. These changes incl ...

. His research focuses on

protease A protease (also called a peptidase, proteinase, or proteolytic enzyme) is an enzyme that catalyzes (increases reaction rate or "speeds up") proteolysis, breaking down proteins into smaller polypeptides or single amino acids, and spurring the ...

s and their inhibitors in humans, with particular emphasis on the

caspase Caspases (cysteine-aspartic proteases, cysteine aspartases or cysteine-dependent aspartate-directed proteases) are a family of protease enzymes playing essential roles in programmed cell death. They are named caspases due to their specific cystei ...

s of the apoptotic cell death pathway. His PhD in

biochemistry Biochemistry or biological chemistry is the study of chemical processes within and relating to living organisms. A sub-discipline of both chemistry and biology, biochemistry may be divided into three fields: structural biology, enzymology and ...

is from the

University of Cambridge , mottoeng = Literal: From here, light and sacred draughts. Non literal: From this place, we gain enlightenment and precious knowledge. , established = , other_name = The Chancellor, Masters and Schola ...

, studying under Alan Barrett (1981). His first posts were at the

Strangeways Research Laboratory Strangeways Research Laboratory is a research institution in Cambridge, United Kingdom. It was founded by Thomas Strangeways in 1905 as the Cambridge Research Hospital and acquired its current name in 1928. Organised as an independent charity, i ...

and

MRC MRC may refer to Government * Medical Research Council (United Kingdom) * Medical Reserve Corps, a US network of volunteer organizations * Municipalité régionale de comté (regional county municipality), Quebec, Canada * Military Revolutionar ...

Laboratory of Molecular Biology in

Cambridge Cambridge ( ) is a university city and the county town in Cambridgeshire, England. It is located on the River Cam approximately north of London. As of the 2021 United Kingdom census, the population of Cambridge was 145,700. Cambridge bec ...

. In 1985, Salvesen moved to the USA, taking up a position at the

University of Georgia , mottoeng = "To teach, to serve, and to inquire into the nature of things.""To serve" was later added to the motto without changing the seal; the Latin motto directly translates as "To teach and to inquire into the nature of things." , establ ...

. He joined the faculty of

Duke University Duke University is a private research university in Durham, North Carolina. Founded by Methodists and Quakers in the present-day city of Trinity in 1838, the school moved to Durham in 1892. In 1924, tobacco and electric power industrialist James ...

in 1987, and moved his laboratory to the Sanford-Burnham Institute for Medical Research, La Jolla,

California California is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States, located along the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the List of states and territori ...

in 1996. As of 2007, Salvesen is the Program Director in Apoptosis and Cell Death Research at the Sanford-Burnham Institute. He also holds an Assistant Professorship at Duke University. He served as the Vice-Chair (the Americas) of the '' Biochemical Journal''.

Key recent publications

*Pop C, Timmer J, Sperandio S, Salvesen GS. (2006) The apoptosome activates caspase-9 by dimerization. ''Mol Cell'' 22: 269–275 *Eckelman BP, Salvesen GS. (2006) The human anti-apoptotic proteins cIAP1 and cIAP2 bind but do not inhibit caspases. ''J Biol Chem'' 281: 3254–3260 *Pop C, Salvesen GS. (2005) The nematode death machine in 3D. ''Cell'' 123: 192–193 *Scott FL, Denault JB, Riedl SJ, Shin H, Renatus M, Salvesen GS. (2005) XIAP inhibits caspase-3 and -7 using two binding sites: evolutionarily conserved mechanism of IAPs. ''EMBO J'' 24: 645–655 *Drag, M., Mikolajczyk, J., Krishnakumar, I. M., Huang, Z. and Salvesen, G. S. (2008) Activity profiling of human deSUMOylating enzymes (SENPs) with synthetic substrates suggests an unexpected specificity of two newly characterized members of the family. Biochem J 409, 461-469 *Riedl, S. J. and Salvesen, G. S. (2007) The apoptosome: signalling platform of cell death. Nat Rev Mol Cell Biol 5, 405-413 *Mikolajczyk, J., Drag, M., Bekes, M., Cao, J. T., Ronai, Z. and Salvesen, G. S. (2007) Small Ubiquitin-related Modifier (SUMO)-specific Proteases: Profiling The Specificities And Activities Of Human Senps. J Biol Chem 282, 26217-26224 *Timmer, J. C., Enoksson, M., Wildfang, E., Zhu, W., Igarashi, Y., Denault, J. B., Ma, Y., Dummitt, B., Chang, Y. H., Mast, A. E., Eroshkin, A., Smith, J., Tao, W. A. and Salvesen, G. S. (2007) Profiling constitutive proteolytic events in vivo. Biochem J 407, 41-48

External links

Burnham Institute for Medical Research: Guy Salvesen, Ph.D.
{{DEFAULTSORT:Salvesen, Guy British biochemists Living people Duke University faculty Year of birth missing (living people)