Manu Hegde, Group Leader and Joint Head of the LMB’s Cell Biology Division, has been elected a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Dating back to 1780, each year the Academy elects new members based on a record of continued accomplishment and excellence in their chosen field. Manu has been recognised for his work in the category of Biochemistry, Biophysics and Molecular Biology.
Manu has been a Group Leader at the LMB since 2011 where he leads research examining how membrane proteins are produced in the cell in the necessary amounts and locations to assemble into machines that are vital for cell health. In a complementary avenue of research, his group also looks at quality control systems, seeking to understand how cells identify errors in protein production and subsequently target the defective products for degradation.
Using biochemical, cell-based and structural approaches, his group has made several advances to help illuminate these key cellular processes, including discovering how cells produce multipass membrane proteins at the endoplasmic reticulum and how cells find and eliminate unassembled “orphan” subunits of protein complexes. His research into these fundamental cellular pathways provide new insights into the mechanisms of cell health and the diseases which arise when they are disrupted, such as in neurodegenerative diseases and cystic fibrosis.
Manu began his career studying for a PhD then an MD at the University of California, San Francisco. He joined the US National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, where he led his independent research group for 11 years before joining the LMB. Manu’s research has previously been recognised with the Feldberg Foundation Prize for Anglo-German scientific exchange and the Eduard Buchner Prize from the German Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology. In 2013 he was elected a member of EMBO and in 2016 a Fellow of the Royal Society. He is also a fellow at Trinity College, Cambridge.
Congratulations to the LMB alumni who have also been elected members of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences; Julie Ahringer and Edward H. Egelman. Julie, who has been elected in the category of Cellular and Developmental Biology, was a postdoc and member of scientific staff in the LMB’s Cell Biology Division from 1991 until 1996. She is now Director of the Gurdon Institute and Professor of Genetics and Genomics at the University of Cambridge. Edward, who joins Manu in the category of Biochemistry, Biophysics and Molecular Biology, was a postdoc in the LMB’s Structural Studies Division from 1982 until 1984 and is now Professor of Biochemistry and Molecular Genetics at the University of Virginia.
Further references
American Academy of Arts & Sciences Press Release
Manu’s group page
Julia Ahringer’s page
Edward H. Egelmn’s page
LMB Awards & Prizes
