Antonina
Roll-Mecak Ph.D., InvestigatorDr. Roll-Mecak received her undergraduate degree in chemical engineering from The Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science
and Art in 1996. She pursued her graduate training in Stephen Burley's laboratory and received her Ph.D. in molecular biophysics
from the Rockefeller University in 2002. Her structural and biochemical studies on translation GTPases helped elucidate the
assembly mechanism of a functional ribosome in all organisms. She conducted her postdoctoral training with Ron Vale at the
University of California, San Francisco where she investigated the mechanism of macromolecular machines that regulate microtubule
dynamics. Dr. Roll-Mecak joined NINDS as an investigator in 2009. Dr. Roll-Mecak has received a Burroughs Wellcome Career
Award in Biomedical Sciences, a L'Oreal for Women in Science Fellowship Award, a Pathway to Independence Award, a Damon Runyon
Cancer Research Postdoctoral Fellowship, and was awarded the Henry W. Reddick Fund Prize and Medal for Mathematics. Her lab
combines biophysical and cell biological approaches to understand the mechanism underlying intracellular organization and
movement, with a focus on the microtubule cytoskeleton.
Research InterestsThe overarching scientific question we are interested in is: how do biophysical properties of microtubules and their modifiers
produce cell morphology and organismal physiology?
Selected Recent PublicationsRoll-Mecak, A. and Vale, R.D.Structural basis for microtubule severing by the hereditary spastic paraplegia protein spastin. - Nature
451(7176) 363-7 2008
Roll-Mecak, A. and Vale, R.D.Making more microtubules by severing: a common theme of noncentrosomal microtubule arrays? - J. Cell. Biol.
175 (6) 849-851 2006
Roll-Mecak, A. and Vale, R. D. The Drosophila Homologue of the Hereditary Spastic Paraplegia Protein, Spastin, Severs and Disassembles Microtubules. - Curr. Biol.
5(7) 650-55 2005
Roll-Mecak, A., Shin, B-S, Dever, T.E., and Burley, S.K. Engaging the ribosome: Universal IFs of translation. - Trends Biochem. Sci.
26(12) 705-709 2001
Roll-Mecak, A., Cao, C., Dever, T.E., and Burley, S.K.X-ray structures of the Universal Translation Initiation Factor IF2/eIF5B: Conformational Changes on GDP and GTP Binding. - Cell
103 781-792 2000
Contact InformationPorter Neuroscience Research Center Building 35
35 Convent Drive, MSC 3701
Bethesda MD
20892-3701
Telephone:
415-476-
6381 (office), 415-
476-6381 (laboratory),
415-476-
5233 (fax), Email:
Antonina@mail.nih.gov