Nurcan Tunçbağ is a Professor of Chemical and Biological Engineering at

Koç University Koç University () is a private non-profit research university in Istanbul, Turkey. It started education in temporary buildings in İstinye in 1993, and moved to its current Rumelifeneri campus near Sarıyer in 2000. Koç University is ranked hi ...

. She works on computational models of complex biological systems. Tunçbağ is a 2019 L'Oréal-UNESCO For Women in Science International Rising Talent.

Early life and education

Tunçbağ studied

chemical engineering Chemical engineering is an engineering field which deals with the study of the operation and design of chemical plants as well as methods of improving production. Chemical engineers develop economical commercial processes to convert raw materials ...

Istanbul Technical University Istanbul Technical University, also known as Technical University of Istanbul (, commonly referred to as İTÜ), is an public university, public technical university located in Istanbul, Turkey. It is the world's third-oldest technical university ...

. She joined

for her graduate studies, earning a master's degree in

computational science and engineering Computational Engineering is an emerging discipline that deals with the development and application of computational models for engineering, known as Computational Engineering Models or CEM. Computational engineering uses computers to solve eng ...

in 2007. She remained there for her doctoral studies, studying protein interactions and their incorporation into protein interaction networks. She worked under the supervision of Özlem Keskin and Attila Gürsoy. In 2010, Tunçbağ joined

Massachusetts Institute of Technology The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is a Private university, private research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. Established in 1861, MIT has played a significant role in the development of many areas of moder ...

as a postdoctoral associate with Ernest Fraenkel. In 2014, Tunçbağ joined the

Middle East Technical University Middle East Technical University (commonly referred to as METU; in Turkish language, Turkish, ''Orta Doğu Teknik Üniversitesi'', ODTÜ) is a prestigious public university, public Institute of technology, technical university located in Ankara, ...

Informatics Institute. She is the PI of the Network Modeling Lab at Koç University.

Research

Tunçbağ works on computational models of complex biological systems. She was in the developer team of the PRISM (protein interactions by structural matching) algorithm that can be used to predict protein–protein interactions and assembly. PRISM can be used to construct cellular pathways and

proteome A proteome is the entire set of proteins that is, or can be, expressed by a genome, cell, tissue, or organism at a certain time. It is the set of expressed proteins in a given type of cell or organism, at a given time, under defined conditions. P ...

annotation. The algorithm can be used to identify 'hot spot' protein binding regions, which can be used to target drugs. Regulatory and signalling networks are essential for cellular function, but omic data is often of poor quality. Tunçbağ has demonstrated how this data can be analysed using a prize collecting

Steiner tree In combinatorial mathematics, the Steiner tree problem, or minimum Steiner tree problem, named after Jakob Steiner, is an umbrella term for a class of problems in combinatorial optimization. While Steiner tree problems may be formulated in a n ...

, analysing changes in networks during disease. She can incorporate pharmaceutical and biological agents into her algorithm to help inform future therapeutics. With Fraenkel, Tunçbağ created SteinerNet, a web server that allowed the integration of omic data. Users provide information about proteins and genes that have been experimentally detected, and the server looks for connections in the data using a series of interactomes. She was also in the developer team of Omics Integrator software that integrates multi-omic data to reconstruct signaling networks. Tunçbağ looks to identify how the genome is altered during disease. One of the diseases considered by Tunçbağ is

Glioblastoma Glioblastoma, previously known as glioblastoma multiforme (GBM), is the most aggressive and most common type of cancer that originates in the brain, and has a very poor prognosis for survival. Initial signs and symptoms of glioblastoma are nons ...

, a particularly malignant brain tumour. Tunçbağ developed a network model that can be used to identify tumour pathway-level changes. She has also worked on neurodegenerative diseases including

Parkinson's disease Parkinson's disease (PD), or simply Parkinson's, is a neurodegenerative disease primarily of the central nervous system, affecting both motor system, motor and non-motor systems. Symptoms typically develop gradually and non-motor issues become ...

. She was made an associate professor in 2017.

Awards and honours

* 2015: Science Academy Young Scientist Award * 2017: METU Parlar Foundation Science Award * 2017: L'Oréal-UNESCO For Women in Science Award * 2018: TÜBA-GEBİP Award * 2019: L'Oréal-UNESCO For Women in Science International Rising Talent *2020: Election to the

Global Young Academy The Global Young Academy (GYA) is an international society of young scientists, aiming to give a voice to young scientists across the globe.... Membership strength is capped at 200, and the membership tenure is 5 years. Organization and member ...

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Tuncbag, Nurcan Turkish women academics Turkish women chemists Turkish bioinformaticians Istanbul Technical University alumni Massachusetts Institute of Technology people Academic staff of Middle East Technical University Koç University alumni Living people Year of birth missing (living people) Turkish women engineers METU Mustafa Parlar Foundation Science Award winners