Welcome.
Electricity is central to life. Sensation of environmental stimuli, thought, learning, memory, and other aspects of neuronal communication, hormone secretion and movement all rely on cellular electrical signals. We study life’s electrical system from a molecular and biophysical perspective.
The focus of the laboratory is on ion channels, transporters and their regulatory complexes that form gated pathways for ionic traffic across cell membranes. We aim to discover how these membrane proteins work at a detailed mechanistic level and what they do in a biological context. To this end, we utilize a range of approaches including structural biology (cryo-EM and X-ray crystallography), electrophysiology, biophysics, biochemistry, pharmacology and imaging. Our goals are to understand the molecular basis of sensory transduction and electrical signaling and to lay the groundwork for development of new approaches to promoting health and treating disease.
Learn more here.
News from the lab:
8/2023: Postdoc Anna Elleman receives an NIH F32 award. Congrats Anna!
6/2023: MCB graduate students Antony Lurie and Madi McCloud (joint student with Hillel Adesnik) join the lab! Welcome Tony and Madi!
1/2023: Ben’s and Trevor’s paper quantifying pressure and ultrasound response of TRAAK is up on bioRxiv. Congrats!
11/2022: Chris’s and Lin’s paper on TMEM87A is now out at eLife
10/2022: Kim’s paper on the structure of SARS-CoV-2 M is now published at eLife
8/2022: Kyle’s paper with Savitha Sridharan and Hillel Adesnik on ChRmine structure and function is published in Nature Communications. Congrats!
8/2022: David’s paper (w. Jennifer Hill during her rotation) on heteromeric LRRC8 channel structures is up on bioRxiv! Lots of cool stuff here including lipids gating the pore. Great collaborations with the Kossiakoff and Isacoff labs.
6/2022: Chris’ and Lin’s paper on TMEM87A structure is up on bioRxiv. This was a lot of fun :)
6/2022: Kim’s and David’s paper on SARS-CoV-2 M protein structure is up on bioRxiv!
6/2022: Toby’s paper on TWIK1 pH gating is out in Nature Communications!
5/2022: BIG congrats to Dr. Chris Hoel and Dr. Toby Turney for graduating with their PhDs from the MCB and Biophysics programs!
4/2022: Work from Ian Tayler and Toby Turney in collaboration with the Adesnik lab to design new ChroME2.0 channelrhodopsins is out in Neuron. Congrats!
2/2022: David’s work (w/ Eva Gerber’s during her rotation) looking at structures of novel SWELL1 channel inhibitors as part of a collaboration with the Kerns and Sah labs is out! Congrats all!
12/2021: Ben Sorum is awarded a K99 award from NINDS! Congrats!
12/2021: MCB grad student Lily Nguyen joins the lab for a rotation. Welcome Lily!
11/2021: Kyle’s paper on ChRmine structure and function is up on the bioRxiv! Another great collaboration with Savitha Sridharan and Hillel Adesnik.
11/2021: Toby’s paper on TWIK1 pH gating is up on bioRxiv!
11/2021: Baobin’s + Chris’ TTYH paper is out in Nature Communications!
9/2021: Anna Elleman joins the lab as a joint postdoc with Rich Kramer! Welcome back to Cal Anna!
8/2021: Robert Rietmeijer is off to join Nura Bio as a Scientist. Best of luck Robert! We’ll miss you!
8/2021: Baobin’s and Chris’ paper on TTYH proteins is up on bioRxiv!
8/2021: Robert’s, Ben’s, and Baobin’s paper showing different leak and mechanically gated open states in TRAAK is now out in Neuron!
6/2021: Trevor joins the lab for his PhD! Welcome back Trevor!
6/2021: Our SARS-CoV-2 ORF3a paper is published in NSMB! Congrats David, Ben, and Chris in the lab! Great collaboration with colleagues Sonali Mali and Diana Bautista, Savitha Sridharan, Dan Toso and Jon Remis at Cal Cryo, and Abhay Kotecha at Thermo!
5/2021: Big congrats to newly minted Dr. Robert Rietmeijer! Our first PhD student to graduate :)
4/2021: Work from Ian Tayler as part of a collaboration with the Adesnik lab to generate new and improved opsins for optogenetics is now up on bioRxiv!
3/2021: David’s recent work with Eva Gerber when she rotated in the lab on SWELL channel inhibition is up on bioRxiv - great collaboration with Rajan Sah at WUSTL!
2/2021: Ben’s and Robert’s paper on ultrasound activation of mechanosensitive TRAAK channels is now published at PNAS!
1/2021: Congrats David on the 3a Methods in Enzymology paper!
12/2020: MCB graduate student Trevor Docter joins the lab for a rotation. Welcome Trevor!
10/2020: Check out Chris’ beautiful work on the structure of as Cas6-Reverse transcriptase-Cas1/Cas2 integrase complex on bioRxiv. This was a great collaboration with Joy Wang, Basem Al-Shayeb, Jill Banfield, and Jennifer Doudna.
9/2020: Baobin’s and Robert’s story on the mechanism of TASK2 gating by pH is now published at Nature!
6/2020: Our preprint on the structure of SARS-CoV-2 3a protein is live! Raw data, maps, and models are all available on EMPIAR/PDB/EMDB. Congrats David, Ben, and Chris!
6/2020: Grad student Kyle Tucker (MCB) joins the lab! Welcome to the team Kyle!
6/2020: Steve and Rich Kramer receive funding from The Rennie Fund for Epilepsy for collaborative work on action potential propagation. Thanks for supporting our work!
4/2020: Steve, Hillel Adesnik, and Diana Bautista receive funding from Fast Grants for a collaborative COVID19 research project. Thanks for supporting our work!
4/2020: Postdoc Lin Zhang joins the lab. Welcome Lin!
4/2020: Michelle’s and David’s KCC4 paper is accepted at eLife!
2/2020: Steve receives a Sloan Research Fellowship. Thank you to the Sloan Foundation for supporting out work!
1/2020: Undergrad Vincent Panico joins the lab. Welcome Vinnie!
10/2019: Michelle’s and David’s KCC4 paper is on the bioRxiv!
5/2019: Steve and Hillel Adesnik are awarded funding from the Rose Hill Innovator Program for a collaborative project. Thanks for supporting our science!
5/2019: Kim Dolan (Biophysics) joins the lab. Welcome Kim!
3/2019: Congrats to Vivian Li on receiving a SURF Undergraduate research fellowship!
2/2019: David’s paper on LRRC8A structure and mechanism of inhibition is accepted at eLife!
1/2019: David got an F32 postdoc fellowship! Way to go David!
10:2018: David’s paper on LRRC8A structure is on the bioRxiv!
6/2018: Postdoc Ben Sorum joins the group. Welcome Ben!
5/2018: Michelle Reid joins the lab for her PhD. Welcome Michelle! And congrats on receiving the Chancellor's Fellowship!
5/2018: Arash Foroutan is headed to Reza Vafabakhsh's lab at Northwestern. Good luck Arash!
3/2018: Congrats to Sheila Sharifi on receiving a SURF Rose Hill Undergraduate Research Fellowship for this summer! Nice work Sheila!
11/2017: Congrats to Robert and Jo! Their paper on studying K2P channel mechanosensitivity is out!
11/2017: A very big thank you to the New York Stem Cell Foundation - Steve is named a NYSCF - Robertson Neuroscience Investigator.
10/2017: Welcome to Cal exchange student Lingshuang Wu.
5/2017: Steve is named a 2017 McKnight Scholar. Thank you to the McKnight Endowment Fund For Neuroscience for supporting our science.
4/2017: Chris Hoel and Toby Turney join the lab for their thesis work. Welcome back guys!
4/2017: Chris receives the Dr. Martha Wade Graduate Fellowship from Alpha Lambda Delta. Congrats Chris!
4/2017: Congrats to Ian Tayler for receiving a SURF L&S fellowship to conduct research in the lab this summer. Nice work Ian!
3/2017: Congrats to Robert Rietmeijer and Chris Hoel for receiving honorable mentions for their NSF fellowship applications.
3/2017: Arash Foroutan joins the lab as a visiting scholar. Welcome Arash!
2/2017: David Kern joins the lab for his postdoc. Welcome David!
1/2017: Welcome to our 3 Cal undergrads starting in the lab this semester: Ian Tayler, Sheila Sharifi, & Alex Bang
10/2016: Steve receives a NIH Director's New Innovator Award. Thanks to the NIH/NIGMS for supporting our science!
8/2016: Steve is awarded a Klingenstein-Simons fellowship award in the Neurosciences. Thank you to the Esther A. & Joseph Klingenstein Fund and the
Simons Foundation for supporting our research.6/2016: Incoming Biophysics student Toby Turney joins the lab for the summer. Welcome Toby!
6/2016: Amgen Scholar Joseph Hernandez joins the lab for the summer. Welcome Joseph!
5/2016: Robert Rietmeijer joins the lab to pursue his PhD! Welcome aboard Robert :)
3/2106: Josefina del Mármol joins the lab as a postdoctoral fellow. Welcome Josefina!
2/2016: Zhu Fu joins the lab as a research specialist. Welcome Zhu!
1/2016: ...and we're off! The Brohawn lab is officially open for business :)