CHAPEL HILL, NC – In the continuing effort to improve upon opioid pain relievers, American and Chinese scientists used cryoEM technology to solve the detailed structures of the entire family of opioid receptors bound to their naturally occurring peptides. Subsequent structure-guided biochemical studies were then performed to better understand the mechanisms of peptide-receptor selectivity and … Read more

The UNC School of Medicine lab of Bryan L. Roth, MD, PhD, solved the high-resolution, complex structures of drug-like compounds bound to designer brain cell receptors, paving the way for the creation of next-generation chemogenetic tools. Postdoc Shicheng Zhang, PhD, led this research published in Nature. Read More

Researchers at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and the UNC Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center have uncovered a new checkpoint that cells use to control what molecules they internalize. Understanding the determinants for entry into cells could lead to the design of better therapeutics that must enter through this gatekeeping mechanism. Read More … Read more