Bostjan Kobe received his BSc (Hons) from the Univeristy of Ljubljana, Slovenia, and his PhD from the University of Texas Soutwestern Medical Center at Dallas, USA, under the supervision of Johann Deisenhofer. He worked as Postdoctoral Fellow at Howard Hughes Medical Institute in Dallas Texas, and at St Vincent's Institute of Medical Research in Melbourne, Australia. He has been at the University of Queensland since the year 2000. He has been awarded the Minister's Prize for achievement in Life Sciences in 2001. He has been appointed ARC Federation Fellow in 2005.

Protein structure and function

Dr Kobe's research theme is protein structure and function, with the emphasis on understanding the structural basis of intra- and intermolecular interactions formed by these macromolecules and inferring function from structure. The research focuses on using structural and molecular information to understand the molecular and cellular functions of proteins, aiming to validate the proteins as therapeutic targets or biotechnological products, and design new therapeutics and biotechnological applications. The primary technique used in the laboratory is X-ray crystallography, combined with a plethora of other molecular biology. biophysical and computational techniques.
Current projects include:
¨ Structural proteomics of macrophage proteins
¨ Mechanism and specificity of nuclear import
¨ Structural basis of signal transduction
¨ Structural basis of plant disease resistance and development
¨ Molecular and structural basis of flavivirus and retrovirus-induced membrane fusion

Awards:

ARC Federation Fellowship, awarded 15/6/2005
ARC Postdoctoral Fellowship, awarded 1/1/1996
Erice Vaciago Award, awarded 3/6/2000
Gold Krka Award, Slovenia, awarded 1/6/1989
Minister's Prize for Achievement in Life Sciences, awarded 25/9/2001
NARF Post-Doctoral Award, awarded 25/11/1998
NHMRC Senior Research Fellowship, awarded 1/1/2003
Nominata Award, awarded 12/5/1994
Pauling Prize, awarded 1/6/1993
Rigaku Fund Award, awarded 13/10/1998
University of Queensland Research Excellence Award, awarded 17/7/2000
Wellcome Senior Research Fellowship, awarded 1/10/1997

Selected Publications:

Forwood JK, Thakur AS, Guncar G, Marfori M, Mouradov D, Meng W, Robinson J, Huber T, Kellie S, Martin JL, Hume DA and Kobe B (2007). Structural basis for recruitment of tandem hotdog domains in acyl-CoA thioesterase 7 and its role in inflammation. Proc Natl Acad Sci USA 104 (25): 10382-10387.

Brinkworth, R.I., Breinl, R.A. and Kobe, B. (2003). Structural basis and prediction of substrate specificity in protein serine/threonine kinases. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 100, 74-79.

Fontes, M.R., Teh, T., Jans, D.A,. Brinkworth, R.I. and Kobe, B. (2003). Structural basis for the specificity of bipartite nuclear localization sequence binding by importin-alpha. J. Biol. Chem. 278, 27981-27987.

Kobe B, Center RJ, Kemp BE and Poumbourios P (1999). Crystal structure of human T cell leukemia virus type 1 gp21 ectodomain crystallized as a maltose-binding protein chimera reveals structural evolution of retroviral transmembrane proteins. Proc Natl Acad Sci USA 96: 4319-4324.

Kobe B and Deisenhofer J (1995). A structural basis of the interactions between leucine-rich repeats and protein ligands. Nature 374: 183-186.

Professional Associations:

Australian Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology

National Association of Research Fellows of NHMRC

Society of Crystallographers in Australia and New Zealand

American Association for the Advancement of Science

Australian Society for Medical Research

Funded Projects:

A Grid Enabled Network for the Molecular and Materials Structure Sciences

ARC Research Network, 2005 - 2009,

Functional and structural characterisation of Defective embryo and meristems (Dem) proteins involved in plant development

ARC Discovery-Project, 2005 - 2007,

New approaches to functional and structural genomics

ARC Federation Fellowship, 2005 - 2010,

Phosphoproteomics: metabolic and exercise signalling markers for sedentary and trained individuals

NHMRC Medical Bioinformatics, Genomics and Proteomics Program , 2006 - 2010,

Structure and function of novel macrophage proteins using high throughput crystallography

ARC Discovery-Project, 2004 - 2006,

Student Projects Available:

Computational biology approaches to characterizing protein-protein interactions

Protein structure-funtion studies in a number of systems including proteins from macrophages, proteins involved in nuclear transport processes, proteins involved in signal transduction, proteins involved in plant disease resistance and development.

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Research Collaborators:

CARROLL Bernard - Molecular genetics of gene expression and development
YOUNG Paul - Molecular Virology
BOTELLA Jimmy - Genetic engineering, molecular biology and signal transduction in plants
MARTIN Jenny
HUME David
KELLIE Stuart - Genes associated with inflammatory diseases
HUBER, Thomas
ROSS, Ian
SCHIRRA, Horst
HARRIS, Jonathan
JANS, David
HANKAMER Ben
MUNN Alan
DODDS, Peter
ANDERSON, Peter
FAIRLIE David
KEMP, Bruce
HILL, Justine
ELLIS, Jeff
BOGOYEVITCH, Marie
BRINKWORTH, Ross
FONTES, Marcos

Postdoctoral Staff:

FORWOOD Jade - The University of Queensland - Structural and Biochemical Characterisation of Protein Complexes Important for Macrophage Activation
GUNCAR Gregor - The University of Queensland
LISTWAN Pawel - The University of Queensland
SAUNDERS Neil - The University of Queensland
FLYNN Shannon - The University of Queensland

Students:

HAMWOOD Tamarind - PhD
MOURADOV Dmitri - PhD
CAMPBELL Phillipa - PhD
O'CONNELL Anthony - PhD
WATTERSON Daniel - PhD
KAMPMANN Thorsten - PhD
SEREK Robert - PhD
THAKUR Anil - MPhil - PhD
WANG Ching I - PhD
YANG Sundy - PhD
DU PREEZ Patrick - PhD
MARFORI Mary - PhD
VE, Thomas - PhD
VE Thomas - PhD

Research Visitors:

Ross Brinkworth