Yu Wang joined the Goodwin laboratory in December 2007. She is
from the Jilin province of China, and she came to us by way of Jilin
University where she majored in Biochemistry and Molecular
Biology. She served as a research associate in the Biology
Experiment Center, the Biochemistry and Molecular Biology
Laboratory, and the Macromolecular Biology Laboratory of Jilin
University. She received a third-place award for her
participation in the Undergraduate Research Opportunity Program of
Jilin University, and she was identified as an Academic Excellence
Scholar for every semester she was a student at the the
university. Her previous research centered on Te-containing
glutathione peroxidase mimics as well as genetic diversity in the
cytochrome P450 CYP2C9 and its implications for drug
metabolism. In the Goodwin laboratory she made essential
contributions to several projects. She showed that the
I'-helix is a critical component used by the C-terminal domain to
modulate the structure and function of the KatG active site some 30
Angstroms away. She also used the stand-alone C-terminal
domain as a starting template for engineering new heme-dependent
enzymes. In the last few months of her time here at Auburn, Dr. Wang
played an integral role in producing a plasmid construct for the
expression of shikimate kinase from M. tuberculosis.
Evaluating this enzyme as a target for the discovery of new
antitubercular agents is a new research direction in the Goodwin
laboratory, and Yu was in on the ground floor of that expansion of
our interests. On November 6, 2012, Yu Wang successfully
defended her doctoral dissertation entitled: Gene Duplication
and Fusion: Strategy for Active Site Control and Starting Point
for New Catalysts. She officially graduated from Auburn
University with her PhD on December 8, 2012. Dr. Wang moved on
to the laboratory of Dr. Robert White at Virginia Tech for her
postdoctoral studies. She then accepted a faculty position in the
Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry at the University of North
Georgia in Dahlonega, GA. She received tenure and promotion to
Associate Professor in 2020. Dr. Wang has since moved into the
medical profession. She is now starting her third year of medical
school at the Morehouse School of Medicine.
Publications and Abstracts
Simithy, J., Gill, G., Wang, Y., Goodwin, D.C., and Calderón,
A.I. 2015. "Development of an ESI-LC-MS based assay for kinetic
evaluation of M. tuberculosis shikimate kinase" Anal. Chem.
87, 2129 - 2136.
Wang, Y., and Goodwin D.C. 2012. Integral role of the I'-helix in
the function of the "inactive" C-terminal domain of
catalase-peroxidase (KatG). Biochim.
Biophys. Acta 1834,
362 - 371.
Wang, Y., and Goodwin,
D. C. 2012. The participation of conserved I’-helix in structure,
stability, and catalytic function of KatG. Third Southeast Enzymes
Conference, Atlanta, GA.
Wang, Y., and Goodwin, D. 2011. Contribution of an
“inactive” domain to rapid H2O2
decomposition by KatG. 18th Annual
Meeting of the Society for Free Radical Biology and Medicine,
Atlanta, GA.
Wang, Y., and Goodwin, D. C.
2011. Borrowing
the E. coli
catalase-peroxidase C-terminal domain as a scaffold for generation
of new heme-dependent catalysts. Second Southeast Enzymes
Conference, Atlanta, GA.
Chen, Z. B., Zhang, B. X., Huang, Z. X., Peng, Q. L, Chen, J., Wang,
Y., Zhang, G. Z., Li, W.S., and Liu, L. Y. 2006. Synthesis and
kinetics of a novel mimic with glutathione peroxidase
activity: Tellurium-containing hyaluronic acid (TeHA). Chin.
Chem.
Lett. 17, 969 - 972.