Li Dianfan

Biography

LI Dianfan is a Professor of Institute of Biochemistry and Cell Biology, Shanghai Institutes for Biological Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences, hanghai, China. Research Areas: Membrane protein structure & function and related frontier technologies Research Interests: Membrane proteins, including transporters, channels, receptors, and lipid metabolizing enzymes, play vital roles in biology, and makes up 60% of approved drug targets. Revealing their three dimension structures is crucial in understanding how these important macromolecules function at the molecule level. One research direction in our lab is to solve structures of physiologically and pharmaceutically important membrane proteins, mainly by X-ray crystallography. Getting diffraction-quality crystal a key step in this approach. The lipid cubic phase, where the membrane proteins are hosted in native-like bilayers made of lipids, mostly monoacylglycerol with a single cis-double bond in the fatty chain, is the main method we use and develop for crystalizing and characterizing membrane proteins.

Research Interest

Membrane proteins, including transporters, channels, receptors, and lipid metabolizing enzymes, play vital roles in biology, and makes up 60% of approved drug targets. Revealing their three dimension structures is crucial in understanding how these important macromolecules function at the molecule level. One research direction in our lab is to solve structures of physiologically and pharmaceutically important membrane proteins, mainly by X-ray crystallography. Getting diffraction-quality crystal a key step in this approach. The lipid cubic phase, where the membrane proteins are hosted in native-like bilayers made of lipids, mostly monoacylglycerol with a single cis-double bond in the fatty chain, is the main method we use and develop for crystalizing and characterizing membrane proteins.