What is Structural Biology?
Structural Biology aims at providing an understanding of the functions of biological macromolecules and cells in terms of their three dimensional structures. Insights are gained by three-dimensional structure determination at resolutions appropriate to the problem, ranging from cellular to atomic. Structural Biology underpins the development of key aspects of Biotechnology, a priority area for South Africa, which includes rational drug design, the design of vaccines and agrichemicals and the design of enzymes for industrial purposes. The key technologies underpinning the development of structural biology are X-ray crystallography, electron microscopy, nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy, computational modelling and bioinformatics.
Structural biology as a discipline remains undeveloped in South Africa. A lack of infrastructure, insufficient depth of appropriate skills and a lack of appropriate mechanisms to attract students into the field have hampered its development.
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Aims of the Initiative
The Initiative aims at establishing structural biology firmly in Africa for the first time by exploiting the synergies that exist between the three universities in the Western Cape, namely the University of Cape Town, the University of the Western Cape and the University of Stellenbosch. UCT and UWC will jointly offer a Master's Degree in Structural Biology by coursework and dissertation, where staff who are leaders in their various disciplines will collaborate to offer a world class teaching and research environment for prospective students. The development of this programme is funded by a generous grant from the Carnegie Corporation of New York.
This programme is an early venture in inter-institutional co-operation. Thus, the programme has been defined within the legal framework of the national educational system and utilises the existing organizational infrastructures at both institutions for the benefit of the joint programme. In order to achieve this, a high level inter-institutional committee was created to monitor the programme: The committee comprises the programme co-ordinators, Deans of Science and senior people with responsibility for research from both UCT and UWC. Additionally, the programme co-ordinators, Deans of Science from both institutions, the director of research in the Medical Faculty at UCT and one member of the programme team from both UCT and UWC are constituted to oversee the staff recruitment and appointment process.
A unique feature of the Masters programme is that students will have the opportunity of interacting with leading international experts in Structural Biology who will come to South Africa to participate in the programme.
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Significance of the Project
The establishment of structural biology as a formal discipline in South Africa will:
Substantially increase local knowledge of biological structure
Open the way to the determination of structure locally
Establish the manpower for industry based on structural knowledge, including structure based drug design.
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Techniques
A wide range of techniques are employed in this endeavour including:
Confocal microscopy,
Scanning and transmission electron microscopy,
X-ray crystallography,
NMR,
Computer Modelling,
Bioinformatics.
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People involved
The members of the Initiative include:
Trevor Sewell
Susan Kidson
David Pugh
Ed Sturrock
Mike Lawrence
Our short term goals are the promotion of the field, the sharing of resources and expertise and the establishment of a coursework masters programme in Structural Biology.
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