Structural Biology of Cellular Signaling (Scheerer Lab)

In particular, the group is interested on structural investigations of various G-protein-coupled receptor (GPCRs), photoreceptors (e.g. vertebrate cone and rhodopsins, microbial rhodopsins, phytochromes, photolyases, melanopsins), GPCR-related signaling proteins (e.g. G-proteins, arrestins, phosphodiesterases, dishevelled) and several metalloenzymes (e.g. [NiFe]-hydrogenases and lipoxygenases). A wide array of different techniques are applied in the lab to study different protein systems, such as membrane and soluble protein production (e.g. different heterologous cell expression systems), molecular biology, biochemical, biophysical (e.g. mulit-angle light scattering, differential scanning calorimetry, microscale thermophoresis) and crystallization (using robot-platforms, conventional, lipid cubic phase (LCP), micelle/ bicelle). The core skills of the Scheerer lab are protein-production and -engineering, protein X-ray crystallography and combined crystallographic-spectroscopic approaches with a broad network of international collaborators and access to several high-end synchrotrons. In the last years, the group established also conventional and pump-probe methods for our protein samples at free electron laser facility LCLS-SLAC in Stanford, USA. In parallel, Dr. Scheerer and his group started a collaboration with their in-house partners on cryo-electron microscopy to investigate several membrane protein and protein-complex targets.