Regina Stevens-Truss, Ph.D.

     Ms. Irena Gribovskaja

a Kalamazoo College Health Sciences major (class of 2003) is currently attending the University of Wisconsin Medical School.  She conducted her Senior Individualized Project (SIP) entitled "Effects of calmodulin's calcium binding sites II and IV on the activity of inducible nitric oxide synthase" in the lab (summer 2002) as a Howard Hughes Medical Institute Student Research Fellow (Kalamazoo College).  Her research was done in an effort to complete phase 1 of the main project that has been ongoing in my lab for two years.  The completion of phase 1 (understanding how calcium's interaction with calmodulin affects calmodulin's ability to activate NOS) has launched us into phase 2 (determination of the amino acid residues that are involved in the interactions between CaM and NOS) of this project.  Her results in combination with previous data from this lab are being submitted to Biochemistry (Sept. 2004).  

     Ms. Whitney Goode

a Kalamazoo College Chemistry  major (class of 2003) is attending Tufts University Dental School. Her SIP project entitled "Spectral analysis of the effects that solvent composition has on the heme Soret of nitric oxide synthase" was conducted as preliminary studies for phase 2 of the lab's research plans (summer 2002).  Her research yielded information about the amino acid composition of the active sites of the neuronal and inducible NOSs that will be useful in the design of active site inhibitor molecules.  Based on the crystal structures of the heme domain of the NOSs it has been speculated that the active site pockets decrease in the order neuronal > inducible > endothelial (Gerber, N. C., et al., 1997, JBC, 272:6285).  Whitney's research supports this previous observation, and is the first time that solvent effects on the active site of NOS has been investigated.

Summer of 2001:

    Mr. Sam Dennis

a Kalamazoo College Health Sciences major (class of 2002) conducted his SIP in the lab (done summer 2001).  His thesis entitled "The effects that mutating calcium binding site III of calmodulin has on the activity of inducible nitric oxide synthase" was a continuation of work started in the lab during the summer of 2000. Our previous work (Stevens-Truss, R., et al., 1997, Biochem., 36:12337) had demonstrated that this mutation had little effect on the neuronal NOS.  This research was important to our quest at understanding the differences in calmodulin's activation of NOSs (Manuscript submitted to Biochemistry, Sept. 2004).

    Ms. Patrice Fields

a Kalamazoo College Chemistry major (class of 2004) is attending The University of Cincinnati majoring in Chemistry.  Patrice worked in the lab during the summer of her first year at Kalamazoo College (summer 2001).  She was one of 7 students awarded a Research Fellowship through Kalamazoo College's Howard Hughes Medical Institute student researcher program during the summer of 2001.  Her worked has significance in our understanding of nitric oxide synthase and its inhibition by the P450 inhibitor Oltipraz, and a manuscript resulted from her work (Furge, L. L., et al, 2004, ABB, 424:163). Patrice was also instrumental in helping to develop a new line of investigations currently being conducted in the lab (in collaboration with Dr. D. Blaine Moore, Kalamazoo College) whereby we are studying the molecular mechanisms of microglial cell activation.
 
Summer of 2000/2001: 

    Mr. Kaleb Brownlow

a Kalamazoo College Biology major (class of 2001), is attending The Jackson School of International Studies, MAIS Program in Seattle, WA. His SIP project (done summer 2000) entitled "Activity of Inducible Nitric Oxide Synthase Requires Bound Calcium at Either Site I or Site III of Calmodulin" was the first set of experiments done that compared the Ca2+-binding sites of CaM with respect to activation of iNOS (Manuscript submitted to Biochemistry, Sept. 2004). Kaleb continued to work in the lab during the summer of 2001 following graduation on a pilot project in collaboration with Dr. Hank Mossberg (The University of Michigan) and Dr. Vivien Pybus (Kalamazoo College), screening peptides as potential anti-microbial agents.