Jan Abendroth, Ph.D.
Group Leader II

"We are successful because we take ownership of our projects and care about your research."

Jan is lead scientist on various structure determination research collaborations with clients and one of the main crystallography contributors to the Seattle Structural Genomics Center for Infectious Disease. Jan also oversees the operations of Emerald’s Crystallization Laboratory and structure determination activities. Jan also leads the methods development for routine application of de-novo phasing using anomalous diffraction from iodide. Jan joined Emerald BioStructures in 2007. As a postdoctoral fellow he researched on the structural biology of complexes of membrane and soluble protein in Dr. Wim Hols' laboratory at the University of Washington (Seattle). Jan earned his Doctorate in Biochemistry in 2001 from the Universität zu Köln (Cologne, Germany), and received his undergraduate education both at the Universität zu Köln and at the NTNU in Trondheim, Norway. Jan has published his research in 17 peer-reviewed journal articles, 10 of which as first author.

Kateri Atkins
Group Leader I

“Successful collaborations begin with excellent communication and thrive when team members take ownership of the research."

Kateri has been an integral team member on many successful collaborations. She is currently responsible for managing all protein purification activities. She earned her Bachelor of Science degree in Biology from Old Dominion University in 2000. Kateri joined Emerald BioStructures in 2005 as a Research Associate and recently rejoined the company after relocating to Washington State.

Darren Begley, Ph.D.
Group Leader I

"Integrating X-ray crystallography with NMR, SPR and other biophysical techniques provides a robust and versatile strategy for characterizing drug lead interactions with their targets."

Darren is Group Leader for the Biophysics core at Emerald, which includes our nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectroscopy laboratory and management of our small molecule screening compound libraries. He has successfully led several fragment screening campaigns, and routinely conducts biophysics experiments to characterize drug lead binding interactions with biological molecules in solution. Darren earned his Ph.D. in Chemistry at the University of Washington in 2009 under the direction of Gabriele Varani, and a B.Sc. from McGill University in Montréal, Canada. Darren completed a post-doctoral course of study at Emerald for the Seattle Structural Genomics Center for Infectious Disease, integrating NMR, SPR, and X-ray crystallography to characterize the binding of small molecules with infectious disease proteins. Darren has written and published several first-author peer-reviewed papers, as well as two book chapters for a volume of Methods in Enzymology devoted to fragment-based screening and drug design.

Lawrence E. Chun, M.S/Ph.C.
Project Leader II

"aut viam inveniam aut faciam (I'll either find a way or make one)."

Larry has been the lead scientist on numerous multi-year structure determination research collaborations specializing in kinase crystallography and has delivered over 120 structures to clients. Larry joined BioStructures in 2002 as a Research Associate after earning his Ph.C in Biological Structure from the University of Washington in 1992, and his B.S. from the University of Notre Dame. Larry brings extensive protein purification and crystallization experience to Emerald. Larry has published 7 peer-reviewed journal articles.

Matthew Clifton, Ph.D.
Project Leader I

“Successful collaboration stems from the ability of all sides to work together towards a common vision; understanding the client’s timelines and goals is essential.”

Matt has extensive experience in NMR spectroscopy, electron-microscopy, and x-ray crystallography, and he has applied this diverse knowledge to a large number of successful collaborations. As a new member to the Emerald BioStructures team, Matt is one of the main crystallography contributors to the Seattle Structural Genomics Center for Infectious Disease (SSGCID), specifically focusing on requests made by the scientific community as a whole. As a postdoctoral fellow, he performed structural studies on a wide variety of proteins from the innate immune system in the laboratory of Dr. Roland Strong at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center. Matt earned his Doctorate in Biochemistry and Molecular Biology from Purdue University where his research focused biochemical and structural studies on membrane proteins including ABC transporters. Matt received his bachelors of science from the University of Oregon.

Tim Craig, Ph.D.
Project Leader I

“Emerald has the tools and experience to do great things for your membrane protein projects that other people told you were impossible dead-ends.”

Tim is a membrane protein scientist with over 10 years of experience. He started his training in membrane protein structural biology at Brandeis University, where he received BS degrees in Biochemistry and Neuroscience. He continued on to receive his Ph.D. from the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas, where he performed NMR, X-ray crystallography, light scattering, and microscale biochemical experiments on components of the SNARE membrane fusion machinery. After his Ph.D., Tim completed his postdoctoral fellowship with Novartis, where he worked on accelerating production and crystallization of G-Protein Coupled Receptors (GPCRs), Ion Channels, and other membrane proteins for preclinical drug discovery.

James Fairman, Ph.D.
Group Leader I

“Una validiores sumus (Together we are stronger) - the collaborative environment at Emerald BioStructures allows us to use innovative technologies to solve difficult problems.”

Jim received his Ph.D. in Biochemistry, Cellular, and Molecular Biology from the University of Tennessee, Knoxville in 2009 working with Dr. Chris Dealwis, where he studied macromolecular crystallography. During his time there he solved the structure of human ribonucleotide reductase, an important anti-cancer chemotherapeutic drug target, in complex with substrate and allosteric effector molecules. He then went on to do a 2 year post-doctoral fellowship in the Intramural Research Training program at the National Institutes of Health under the supervision of Dr. Susan Buchanan, where he studied purification and crystallization of membrane proteins. His research at the NIH centered on the bacterial adhesion membrane proteins intimin and invasin, and lead to the first ever de novo phased lipidic cubic phase membrane protein X-ray crystal structure. Jim joined Emerald BioStructures in 2011, where he applies his experience in membrane protein crystallography to SSGCID and client projects. Jim has published 6 peer-reviewed journal articles, 2 as first author.

David Fox, Ph.D.
Project Leader I

“Problem solving is always at the heart of every collaboration, and having the drive and determination to never give up on difficult problems is the key to success.”

David received his Ph.D. in Biochemistry at the University of Washington in 2008 under the direction of Rachel Klevit, where he characterized several breast cancer related protein complexes through a variety of biophysical and structural techniques including NMR spectroscopy, X-ray crystallography, and circular dichroism. David finished his post-doctorate studies at the National Institutes on Aging in 2011 under the direction of Weidong Wang, where he continued to apply biophysical and structural techniques to the study of DNA binding and repair proteins involved in Fanconi Anemia. He has extensive experience that spans gene to structure including bioinformatics, construct design, expression and purification of protein complexes, protein characterization and structure determination by both NMR Spectroscopy and X-ray crystallography

Anna S. Gardberg, Ph.D.
Project Leader I

"A key aspect of successful collaborations is identifying the strengths of each partner to maximize efficiency."

Anna has driven numerous research collaborations in several aspects of macromolecular structural determination including X-ray and neutron diffraction studies. Anna also has extensive experience in solid-state and small-molecule crystallography. Anna obtained her PhD in Inorganic Chemistry from Northwestern University in 2001. Anna joined BioStructures in 2010 following postdoctoral work at Oak Ridge National Laboratory. Anna has published 16 peer-reviewed journal articles, 11 as first author.

Don Lorimer, Ph.D.
Project Leader II

"The level of intensity at Emerald is unparalleled in the industry and the teamwork displayed by my colleagues is a critical factor in our success."

Don has over twenty years experience in drug discovery and played a major role in the development of Gene Composer software, Emerald’s tool for designing proteins and engineering genes for synthesis. Don has been the lead scientist on multiple gene-to-structure research collaborations, specializing in protein expression, protein engineering and protein crystallization. Don earned his PhD in Biochemistry from Michigan State University in 1989 and joined BioStructures in 2005 after working for Structural GenomiX and Axys Pharmaceuticals.

Peter Nollert, Ph.D.
Project Leader II

"We are fond of simple innovative technologies, especially in the area of membrane protein crystallization. Our interests circle around G-protein coupled receptors, microfluidics, lipid materials and we are focused on developing and commercializing technologies for the life science marketplace."

Peter oversees Emerald's membrane protein research and technology development activities. He earned his Diploma (eqiv. B.Sc.) in Biochemistry from the Eberhard Karls University, Tuebingen in Germany in 1993, and his Dr.rer.nat (eqiv Ph.D.) in 1997 in Biochemistry and Biophysics from the Max-Plank Institute for Biology and the Eberhard Karls University, Tuebingen Germany. He served in Postdoctoral Fellowships at the Biocenter, University of Basel, Switzerland; at Stanford University; and at the University of California San Francisco where he was trained in the field of protein X-ray crystallography. Peter has determined the structures of bacterial Glycerol Channel proteins and developed novel methodologies that were successfully applied for the structure determination of several transmembrane proteins. Peter joined Emerald BioStructures/BioSystems in 2002 as a Research Scientist. Peter has served as Principle Investigator and Co-Investigator on three SBIR grant funded projects and an NIH-funded Program Project targeted at developing technologies for membrane protein crystallization. He has managed several gene-to-crystal structure and technology development projects within Emerald BioStructures and has authored and co-authored 26 papers published in peer-reviewed scientific journals. He is inventor on 5 issued U.S. patent and 2 recent U.S. patent applications.

Amy Raymond, Ph.D.
Group Leader II

"Consistent, clear communication and data-driven decisions make the shared vision of the successful outcome a reality."

Amy has been the Project Leader on many successful structure determination and enzymatic activity projects, and currently oversees all cloning and bacterial fermentation activities at Emerald BioStructures. Amy also specializes in lab automation and data management. Amy earned her Ph.D. in Molecular and Cellular Biology from the UC San Diego/San Diego State University Joint Doctoral Program and completed her postdoctoral training at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center before joining Emerald BioStructures in 2007. Amy has published 11 peer reviewed journal articles.

Pam Witte, B.A.
Group Leader I

"Attention to detail and a desire to succeed are the keys to a successful collaboration."

Pam has been the lead scientist on various inhibitor screening projects. She is currently responsible for managing the Insect and Mammalian Cell Culture functions, as well as the Assay Group at Emerald BioStructures. Pam joined Emerald BioStructures in 2003 as a Research Scientist after working for 10 years in the fields of Drug Discovery and Virology. Pam has published 9 peer reviewed articles.