Melissa Dokarry

I graduated from the University of East Anglia in July 2006 with a Bsc(Hons) in Biochemistry.  I am now continuing my studies as a PhD student in a joint Norwich Research Park Studentship-funded project jointly supervised by Dr Andrew Hemmings (University of East Anglia) and Professor Anne Osbourn (John Innes Centre). 

The title of my thesis research is "Probing structure-product relationships in plant oxidosqualene cyclases."  My project is part of a broader collaboration between the Osbourn and Hemmings labs.

Currently my work is focused on beta-amyrin synthase, the enzyme that catalyses the first committed step in avenacin synthesis in oat.  I hope to develop my skills in protein expression and structural modelling to look more closely at the mechanism and product specificity of this enzyme and to understand what features distinguish it from its presumed progenitor, the primary sterol biosynthetic enzyme cycloartenol synthase.