Cyclopamine and the Hedgehog Signaling Pathway: Chemistry, Biology and Medical Perspectives

讲座人简介：

Athanassios Giannis is a chemist and physician. He was born in Drama/Greece in 1954 and studied chemistry from 1972 to 1980 and medicine from 1978 to 1987 at the University of Bonn/Germany. He completed his Diploma Thesis in 1980 with Manfred T. Reetz and his PhD in 1986 with Konrad Sandhoff. He habilitated in 1992 at the University of Bonn in Organic Chemistry and Biochemistry. From 1998 to 2002 he was an Associate Professor at the University of Karlsruhe. Since 2002 he has been Full Professor for Organic Chemistry and Natural Products Chemistry at the University of Leipzig/Germany. His area of research is biological and medicinal-oriented organic chemistry.

Research interests: Synthesis of bioactive natural products and their analogues like alkaloids,peptidomimetics,carbohydrates, analogues of ATP and of sphingolipids. In particular he is interested in the rational design and synthesis of inhibitors of angiogenesis,modulators of glycoconjugate biosynthesis and in the development of inhibitors of sphingomyelinase and ceramide formation.Furthermore, the development of inhibitors of histone modifying enzymes and of kinesines as well as modulators of the hedgehog signaling pathway are part of his research interests. The rational development of modulators of hydrogensulfide (H₂S) formation as well as synthesis of oligosaccharides and their use for the study of interactions between cells and extracellular matrix are his more recent fields of interest.