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BMB PhD Program Faculty

Jun O. Liu

Design and synthesis of novel macrocycle libraries

Professor

Department of Pharmacology and Molecular Sciences 
School of Medicine

Jun Liu

Research Overview

Our primary research interest lies at the interface between chemistry, biology, and medicine. We design and synthesize libraries of macrocycles inspired by bioactive natural products. We conduct cell- and target-based high-throughput screens of small molecule libraries including the Johns Hopkins Drug Library and natural products-inspired macrocycle libraries to identify modulators of various cellular processes and pathways that have been implicated in human diseases from cancer to autoimmune diseases. Once biologically active inhibitors are identified, they will serve both as probes of the biological processes of interest and as leads for the development of new drugs for the treatment of a variety of human diseases.

Among the biological processes of interest are cancer cell growth and apoptosis, angiogenesis, signal transduction, eukaryotic transcription and translation.

Additional Titles

Co-Director, Cancer Chemical and Structural Biology, Kimmel Comprehensive Cancer Center

Director, Drug Discovery Core, FAMRI Center of Excellence at Johns Hopkins

Director, ChemCORE High-throughput Screening Facility, IBBS, School of Medicine

 

 

Topic Areas

Selected Publications

  • Liu JO. Science, 2023. 
  • Park H, Kam TI, Peng H, Chou SC, Mehrabani-Tabari AA, Song JJ, Yin X, Karuppagounder SS, Umanah GK, Rao AVS, Choi Y, Aggarwal A, Chang S, Kim H, Byun J, Liu JO, Dawson TM, Dawson VL. Cell, 2022. 
  • Guo Z, Hong SY, Wang J, Rehan S, Liu W, Peng H, Das M, Li W, Bhat S, Peiffer B, Ullman BR, Tse CM, Tarmakova Z, Schiene-Fischer C, Fischer G, Coe I, Paavilainen VO, Sun Z, Liu JO. Nature Chemistry, 2019.
  • Guo Z, Cheng Z, Wang J, Liu W, Peng H, Wang Y, Rao AVS, Li RJ, Ying X, Korangath P, Liberti MV, Li Y, Xie Y, Hong SY, Schiene-Fischer C, Fischer G, Locasale JW, Sukumar S, Zhu H, Liu JO. Angewandte Chemie (International ed. in English), 2019. 
  • Peiffer BJ, Qi L, Ahmadi AR, Wang Y, Guo Z, Peng H, Sun Z, Liu JO. Cell Chemical Biology, 2019. 

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