Ioannis P. Gerothanassis

Biography

Biographical Sketch: 1974 (1975: year of award): BSc Degree in Chemistry, Aristotle Univ. of Thessaloniki. 1974-1977: Military service. 1977: 3 years fellowship from the Greek Scholarship Foundation for postgraduate studies in England. 1978 (1979: year of award): MSc degree in Chemical Spectroscopy in the School of Chemical Sciences, University of East Anglia. Title: Natural Abundance Oxygen-17 Fourier Transform NMR Studies, pp.1-196. 1980 (1981: year of award): PhD thesis, School of Chemical Sciences, University of East Anglia. Title: Studies of 17O NMR Spectroscopy, pp.1-259. 1980: Postdoctorate fellowship from the “Swiss Fond National” for NMR Biophysical Research in the University of Lausanne, Institute of Organic Chemistry. 1981-1984: “Premier Assistant”, University of Lausanne, Institute of Organic Chemistry. 1984: Lecturer, Section of Physical Chemistry, Department of Chemistry, School of Natural Sciences, University of Ioannina, Greece. 1986: Assistant Professor, Section of Organic Chemistry and Biochemistry, Department of Chemistry, University of Ioannina, Greece. 1990: Associate Professor in the same Department. October 1994: Honorary Research Fellow of the Queen Mary College, Univ. of London. September 1997: Full Professor, Department of Chemistry, University of Ioannina. September 1997-August 2000: Head of the Section of Organic Chemistry and Biochemistry, Department of Chemistry, University of Ioannina. September 1998-August 2000: Vice Chairman of the Department of Chemistry. September 2000-August 2004: Chairman of the Department of Chemistry. September 2003-August 2006: Vice Rector of the University of Ioannina. September 2006-August 2010: Rector of the University of Ioannina. September 2010-today: Member of the Hellenic Quality Assurance Agency for Higher Education (HQAA). July 2011: DSc, University of East Anglia.

Research Interest

Bioorganic Chemistry, Medicinal Chemistry and Structural Biology Multinuclear and multidimensional NMR studies in solution of: a) the angiotensin converting enzyme (ACE) and synthetic polypeptide model compounds; b) Myelin Basic Protein Epitopes (MBP); c) Mapping of protein-ligand and ligand-receptor interactions through flexible docking calculations (implications to ACE and angiotensin II- AT1 receptor). Determination of the three dimensional structures of peptide hormones in solution by the use of NMR and molecular dynamics calculations-investigation of solvation-hydration phenomena of cis/trans amides, model peptides and peptide hormones - origin of cis isomer stabilization in proteins. Multidisciplinary approach for decoding the chemoprevention mechanism of biophenols from plant natural products: isolation, structure analysis and biological evaluation. NMR Structural Studies and Analytical Applications in Natural Products Chemistry and Food Chemistry Identification and quantitative evaluation of natural products in complex plant extracts of Greek flora, and of the lipid fraction of milk and cheese by the use of high resolution one- and two- dimensional NMR (COSY, TOCSY, NOESY, ROESY), Mass Spectrometry and HPLC methods. Development of hyphenated (coupled) methodologies of HPLC and NMR Spectroscopy and Chemically Induced Dynamic Nuclear Polarization (CIDNP) NMR Spectroscopy. Rapid NMR and multidimensional fingerprint identification and quantification of crude edible plant extracts of Greek flora.