Dennis Quentin awarded by the largest chemical society in Europe

Dr. Dennis Quentin received the PhD Thesis Award of the Biochemistry Section of the Gesellschaft Deutscher Chemiker (GDCh). He performed his doctoral work on "Structural studies on the Type VI secretion system and human CLN3p" in the department Structural Biochemistry of Prof. Dr. Stefan Raunser.

In his PhD thesis Dennis Quentin established the recombinant production of the elusive human membrane protein CLN3p, which is known for its crucial role in Batten disease, using four of the most common heterologous expression hosts. Furthermore, he biochemically and structurally characterized the Tse6 effector-loaded spike complex of the Type VI secretion system.

Both, his work on the human CLN3 protein and the newly gained insights into the bacterial Type VI secretion system, provided by using cryo-electron microscopy, help to improve the molecular understanding of Childhood Dementia (NCL) and bacterial infections. 

The GDCh is the largest chemical society in continental Europe with members from academe, education, industry and other areas. The Biochemistry Section of the GDCh sponsors the award for outstanding research achievements in the field of biochemistry proven by a dissertation or publication. The prize was awarded during the GDCh Science Forum 2019 on 16.09.2019 in Aachen.

JJ / Picture: mika-photography.com