Increased Productivity at Technische Universität, Berlin Customer Case

Dr. Ana Perez-Lopez is a postdoctoral fellow in the lab of Prof. Juri Rappsilber at Technische Universität Berlin. She found some time to talk to us about the world of organic synthesis.

“I have always been fascinated with the ability of chemistry to produce drugs, medicines and therapies. It was therefore natural for me to pursue my Ph.D. in Medicinal Chemistry, where I synthesized small peptide drugs designed to inhibit protein-protein interactions involved in numerous neurodegenerative diseases. During my Ph.D. I had the opportunity to work in Prof. Bradley’s group at the University of Edinburgh, producing fluorescence probes for better cancer diagnosis. This ignited my interest with cancer and introduced me to the coalface where the chemistry lab meets the clinic. In 2014, I started working at Cancer Research UK developing metal catalysts for targeted anticancer therapies. Working within a hospital brought me even closer to clinicians, biologists and patients. I recently moved to TU Berlin with an IPODI fellowship, where I am learning proteomics in the group of Prof. Juri Rappsilber, and in the process I have just set up a fully-equipped organic chemistry lab in the Department of Bioanalytics.”