Posted on August 14, 2012

Keck Foundation Awards $1 Million to Northwestern University for Protein Research

Northwestern University has announced a $1 million grant from the W.M. Keck Foundation in support of research that could accelerate the understanding of disease at the molecular level and help define the human proteome — that is, all the healthy proteins in tissues and organs.

Awarded to Neil Kelleher, the Walter and Mary E. Glass professor of molecular biosciences and professor of chemistry who directs the Proteomics Center of Excellence at Northwestern, the grant will fund the development of a hybrid mass spectrometer, which will be used to better understand protein complexes from mitochondria in cells. Using this advanced technology, the team aims to determine the precise composition of multi-protein assemblies and how they change in models of aging and cancer.

Co-investigator Navdeep Chandel, a professor of medicine and cell and molecular biology at Northwestern's Feinberg School of Medicine, will provide the biological drivers for the project. Both Kelleher and Chandel are members of the university's Robert H. Lurie Comprehensive Cancer Center. The mass spectrometer will be developed in collaboration with laboratory equipment and services provider Thermo Fisher Scientific.