Maria I. Zavodszky
Research Assistant Professor

B.S. 1984, Babes-Bolyai University, Cluj, Romania
M.S. 1999, Kansas State University
Ph.D. 2003, Michigan State University

zavodszm@ge.com
505 Biochemistry Building
Michigan State University
East Lansing, MI 48824-1319
Phone: 517-432-7177
Fax: 517-353-9334

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Maria I. Zavodszky

Research Interests

Life, from a biochemist's perspective, can be viewed as multiple and interconnecting series of specific binding steps. Because living organisms are made up of molecules, all life's processes depend on these molecules recognizing and binding to each other in such a specific and accurate way that has puzzled scientists since the beginning of modern biochemistry.

I am interested in computational modeling of protein-protein and protein-small molecule (ligand) interactions, which are of great practical importance for elucidating biochemical pathways and for finding specific ligands for proteins that are potential targets for disease therapy.

Proteins are inherently flexible, and they often undergo conformational changes to complement the shape of their binding partner. To accurately model the binding process, I am working on predicting what parts of the protein are likely to behave flexibly based on the crystal structure, and applying novel algorithms to sample large scale motions of the flexible regions. MORE

Recent Publications

Skrzypczak-Jankun E, Borbulevych OY, Zavodszky MI, Baranski MR, Padmanabhan K, Petricek V, Jankun J. (2006) Effect of crystal freezing and small-molecule binding on internal cavity size in a large protein: X-ray and docking studies of lipoxygenase at ambient and low temperature at 2.0 A resolution. Acta Crystallogr D Biol Crystallogr. Jul;62(Pt 7):766-75. Epub 2006 Jun 20.

Jankun J, Aleem AM, Malgorzewicz S, Szkudlarek M, Zavodszky MI, Dewitt DL, Feig M, Selman SH, Skrzypczak-Jankun E. (2006) Synthetic curcuminoids modulate the arachidonic acid metabolism of human platelet 12-lipoxygenase and reduce sprout formation of human endothelial cells. Mol Cancer Ther. May;5(5):1371-82.

Jankun J, Specht Z, Szkudlarek M, Greenfield R, Gaikwad B, Trifonov L, Vaugeois J, Aleem AM, Basrur V, Selman SH, Zavodszky MI, Skrzypczak-Jankun E. (2006) Plasminogen activator inhibitor-1 is locked in active conformation and polymerizes upon binding ligands neutralizing its activity. Int J Mol Med. Mar;17(3):437-47.

Muller TA, Zavodszky MI, Feig M, Kuhn LA, Hausinger RP (2006) Structural basis for the enantiospecificities of R- and S-specific phenoxypropionate/alpha-ketoglutarate dioxygenases. Protein Science 15, 1356-1368.

Zavodszky MI and Kuhn LA (2005) Side-Chain Flexibility in Protein-Ligand Binding: The Minimal Rotation Hypothesis. Protein Science, 14, 1104-1114.

Zavodszky MI, Lei M, Thorpe MF, Day AR, and Kuhn LA (2004) Modeling Correlated Main-Chain Motions in Proteins for Flexible Molecular Recognition. Proteins, 57,243-261.

Lei M, Zavodszky MI, Kuhn LA, Thorpe MF (2004) Sampling Protein Conformations and Pathways. Journal of Computational Chemistry, 25, 1133-1148. MORE