Douglas E. Smith

Department of Physics
University of California, San Diego                
Natural Science Building, Mail Code 0379
9500 Gilman Drive, La Jolla, CA 92093
Email: des@physics.ucsd.edu
http://physics.ucsd.edu/~des/

Research Papers: Click here for list of PDF files

Research topics:
·  Viral DNA packaging in bacteriophages phi29, lambda, and T4
·  Function of ATP-dependent molecular motors
·  Single polymer dynamics (polymer physics, DNA properties)
·  Chromatin assembly and structure
·  Protein mediated DNA looping
·  Restriction endonuclease function
·  Physics of knot formation

Techniques:
·  Manipulation of single DNA molecules with Optical Tweezers
·  Single DNA molecule imaging by fluorescence microscopy
·  Molecular Biology and Biochemistry

Funding:

·  NSF (Physics of Living Systems), Award #0848905 (PI)

·  NIH NIGMS, Award #R01 GM088186 (PI)

Awards:
·  Sloan Foundation Fellow, 2003
·  Beckman Young Investigator Award, 2003
·  Searle Scholars Award, 2002
·  Burroughs Wellcome Fund Career Award in Biomedical Science, 2001
·  Research Corporation Research Innovation Award, 2001
·  Graduate Fellowship, NSF Program in Mathematics and Molecular Biology, 1996
·  Sigma Xi Science Prize, 1993
·  Elected to Phi Beta Kappa, 1993

Background:
Ph.D., Stanford University, 1999
    Thesis research: Manipulation and imaging of single DNA molecules, Single polymer dynamics
    Advisor: Prof. Steven Chu (currently Secretary of Energy, Dept. of Energy)

B.A. in Physics, University of Chicago, 1993

Postdoctoral Fellow, University of California, Berkeley, 1999-2001
    Research: Single-molecule studies of viral DNA packaging
    Advisor: Prof. Carlos Bustamante

Recent collaborators:

· Prof. Michael Feiss, Dept. of Microbiology and Genetics, University of Iowa
·  Profs. Dwight Anderson, Shelley Grimes, and Paul Jardine, Dept. of Diagnostic & Biological Sci., Univ. of Minnesota 
·  Prof. Carlos Catalano, Department of Pharmaceutical Chemistry, University of Washington
·  Prof. Venigalla Rao, Department of Biology, Catholic University of America
·  Prof. James Kadonaga, Division of Biology, University of California, San Diego
·  Prof. Gaurav Arya, Dept. of Nanoengineering, University of California, San Diego

updated 6/2011