Dr. Benjamin Engel
Benjamin David Engel
Department of Molecular Structural Biology
Max Planck Institute of Biochemistry
Am Klopferspitz 18, 82152 Martinsried, Germany
Phone: +49 (89) 8578-2653
Email: engelben@biochem.mpg.de
EDUCATION
2005-2011 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, SAN FRANCISCO
Ph.D. Cell Biology
1999 -2003 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, BERKELEY
B.A. Molecular and Cell Biology with honors
RESEARCH EXPERIENCE
| 2011 - present | Postdoc (Project Leader since 2014), Wolfgang Baumeister, MPI of Biochemistry |
| We are using focused ion beam milling and cryo-electron tomography to study the in situ structural biology of macromolecules within native-state frozen cellular environments. | |
| 2010 | Visiting Scientist, Ritsu Kamiya, University of Tokyo |
| I used electron microscopy to characterize a mutant strain isolated in my graduate studies. | |
| 2005-2011 |
Graduate Student, Wallace Marshall, UC San Francisco |
| I studied the relationship between intraflagellar transport and flagellar length control. | |
| 2001-2005 | Research Associate, Carolyn Larabell, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory |
| I studied cellular defense mechanisms during the early stages of breast cancer metastasis. | |
| 1998-2001 | Student Intern, Advanced Light Source, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory |
FUNDING AND AWARDS
| 2017-2020 | DFG Grant FOR2092, MPI of Biochemistry |
| 2015 | Junior Research Award, MPI of Biochemistry |
| 2011-2013 | Alexander von Humboldt Foundation Research Fellowship, MPI of Biochemistry |
| 2010 | NSF East Asia and Pacific Summer Institutes (EAPSI) Fellowship, University of Tokyo |
| 2008-2009 | Genentech Graduate Fellowship, UC San Francisco |
| 2003 | Departmental Honors, Molecular and Cell Biology, UC Berkeley |
MENTORING AND LEADERSHIP
| 2014-present | Supervisor, graduate students Sahradha Albert, Tilak Gupta, Hugo van den Hoek, Luis Kuhn Cuellar, and Chia-Wei Lee; and post-docs Wojciech Wietrzynski and Anna Rast |
| 2005-2009 | Research Mentor and Classroom Teacher, UCSF Science and Education Partnership |
| 2002-2003 | President, Mortar Board National Senior Honor Society, UC Berkeley Chapter |
INVITED TALKS
| Nov 2018 | University of Vienna MFPL guest lecture; Vienna, Austria |
| Nov 2018 | CNRS Aviesan meeting on How Cryo-EM meets Chemical Structure; Paris, France |
| Oct 2018 | International Conference on Physics and Biological Systems; Gif-sur-Yvette, France |
| Oct 2018 | Keynote speaker; Ohio State Cryo-EM for Cancer workshop, Columbus, OH, USA |
| Sep 2018 | Molecular Horizons seminar; Wollongong, Australia |
| Sep 2018 | International Microscopy Congress; Sydney, Australia |
| Sep 2018 | NTU guest lecture; Singapore |
| Aug 2018 | ETH guest lecture; Zurich, Switzerland |
| Aug 2018 | Keynote speaker; ETH/PSI/Univ. Zurich BSM grad student retreat; Morschach, Switzerland |
| Jun 2018 | International Chlamydomonas Conference; Washington, DC |
| Jun 2018 | Princeton special seminar; Princeton, NJ |
| Jun 2018 | Gordon Research Conference on 3D Electron Microscopy; Newport, RI |
| May 2018 | MPI for Terrestrial Microbiology guest lecture; Marburg, Germany |
| Jan 2018 | UCLA-DOE Institute guest lecture; Los Angeles, CA |
| Jan 2018 | Western Photosynthesis Conference; Oracle, AZ |
| Nov 2017 | CEA guest lecture; Grenoble, France |
| Aug 2017 | German/Austrian/Swiss Microscopy Conference; Lausanne, Switzerland |
| Jul 2017 | Gordon Research Conference on Photosynthesis; Newry, MN |
| Jul 2017 | French Society of Microscopy; Bordeaux, France |
| Jun 2017 | Symposium on Chloroplast Metabolism and Photosynthesis; Neuchâtel, Switzerland |
| Jun 2017 | French Photosynthesis Society; Paris, France |
| Nov 2016 | Univ. Jena botanical colloquium; Jena, Germany |
| Oct 2016 | Nordic Photosynthesis Congress; Copenhagen, Denmark |
| Aug 2016 | International Congress of Photosynthesis; Maastricht, the Netherlands |
| Jun 2016 | International Chlamydomonas Conference; Kyoto, Japan |
| Mar 2016 | Michigan State Plant Research Laboratory seminar series; Lansing, MI |
| Dec 2015 | American Society for Cell Biology minisymposium; San Diego, CA |
| Oct 2015 | Univ. Sheffield molecular biology seminar series; Sheffield, United Kingdom |
| Jul 2015 | Gordon Research Conference on Photosynthesis; Waltham, MA |
PUBLICATIONS *corresponding author
Chicano A, Crosas E, Otón J, Melero R, Engel BD, Daban JR (2019). Frozen-hydrated chromatin from metaphase chromosomes has an interdigitated multilayer structure. The EMBO Journal. [Epub ahead of print, pii: e99769]
Schuller JM, Birrell JA, Tanaka H, Konuma T, Wulfhorst H, Cox N, Schuller SK, Thiemann J, Lubitz W, Sétif P, Ikegami T, Engel BD, Kurisu G, Nowaczyk MM (2019). Structural adaptations of photosynthetic complex I enable ferredoxin-dependent electron transfer. Science. 363:257-260.
Kovtun O, Leneva N, Bykov YS, Ariotti N, Teasdale RD, Schaffer M, Engel BD, Owen DJ, Briggs JAB, Collins BM (2018). Structure of the membrane-assembled retromer coat by cryo-electron tomography. Nature. 561:561–564.
Delarue M, Brittingham GP, Pfeffer S, Surovtsev IV, Pinglay S, Kennedy KJ, Schaffer M, Gutierrez JI, Sang D, Poterewicz G, Chung JK, Plitzko JM, Groves JT, Jacobs-Wagner C, Engel BD*, Holt LJ (2018). mTORC1 controls phase separation and the biophysical properties of the cytoplasm by tuning crowding. Cell. 174:338-349.e320.
Mosalaganti S, Kosinski J, Albert S, Schaffer M, Strenkert D, Salomé PA, Merchant SS, Plitzko JM, Baumeister W, Engel BD*, Beck M (2018). In situ architecture of the algal nuclear pore complex. Nature Communications. 9:2361.
Albert S, Schaffer M, Beck F, Mosalaganti S, Asano S, Thomas HF, Plitzko JM, Beck M, Baumeister W, Engel BD* (2017). Proteasomes tether to two distinct sites at the nuclear pore complex. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA. 114: 13726-13731.
Bykov YS, Schaffer M, Dodonova SO, Albert S, Plitzko JM, Baumeister W, Engel BD*, Briggs JAG (2017). The structure of the COPI coat determined within the cell. eLife. 6:e32493.
Freeman Rosenzweig ES, Xu B, Kuhn Cuellar L, Martinez-Sanchez A, Schaffer M, Strauss M, Cartwright HN, Ronceray P, Plitzko JM, Förster F, Wingreen NS, Engel BD*, Mackinder LCM, Jonikas MC (2017). The Eukaryotic CO2-Concentrating Organelle Is Liquid-like and Exhibits Dynamic Reorganization. Cell. 171:148-162.e19.
Albanese P, Melero R, Engel BD, Grinzato A, Berto P, Manfredi M, Chiodoni A, Vargas J, Sorzano CÓS, Marengo E, Saracco G, Zanotti G, Carazo JM, Pagliano C (2017). Pea PSII-LHCII supercomplexes form pairs by making connections across the stromal gap. Scientific Reports. 7:10067
Pfeffer S, Dudek J, Schaffer M, Ng BG, Albert S, Plitzko JM, Baumeister W, Zimmermann R, Freeze HH, Engel BD*, Förster F (2017). Dissecting the molecular organization of the translocon-associated protein complex. Nature Communications. 8:14516.
Schaffer M, Mahamid J, Engel BD, Laugks T, Baumeister W, Plitzko J (2017). Optimized cryo-focused ion beam sample preparation aimed at in situ structural studies of membrane proteins. Journal of Structural Biology. 197:73-82.
Asano S, Engel BD, Baumeister W (2016). In situ cryo-electron tomography: a post-reductionist approach to structural biology. Journal of Molecular Biology. 428: 332–343.
Engel BD*, Schaffer M, Albert S, Asano S, Plitzko JM, Baumeister W (2015). In situ structural analysis of Golgi intracisternal protein arrays. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA. 112: 11264-11269.
Schaffer M, Engel BD, Laugks T, Mahamid J, Plitzko JM, Baumeister W (2015). Cryo-focused ion beam sample preparation for imaging vitreous cells by cryo-electron tomography. Bio-protocol. 5: e1575.
Engel BD*, Schaffer M, Cuellar LK, Villa E, Plitzko JM, Baumeister W (2015). Native architecture of the Chlamydomonas chloroplast revealed by in situ cryo-electron tomography. eLife. 4: e04889.
Bhogaraju S, Weber K, Engel BD, Lechtreck KF, Lorentzen E (2014). Getting tubulin to the tip of the cilium: one IFT train, many different tubulin cargo‐binding sites? Bioessays. 36: 463-467.
Bhogaraju S, Engel BD, Lorentzen E (2013). Intraflagellar transport complex structure and cargo interactions. Cilia. 2:10.
Shih SM, Engel BD, Kocabas F, Bilyard T, Gennerich A, Marshall WF, Yildiz A (2013). Intraflagellar transport drives flagellar surface motility. eLife. 2: e00744.
Engel BD, Ishikawa H, Wemmer KA, Geimer S, Wakabayashi K, Hirono M, Craige B, Pazour GJ, Witman GB, Kamiya R, Marshall WF (2012). The role of retrograde intraflagellar transport in flagellar assembly, maintenance, and function. The Journal of Cell Biology. 199: 151-167.
Rigort A, Villa E, Bäuerlein FJ, Engel BD, Plitzko JM (2012). Integrative approaches for cellular cryo-electron tomography: correlative imaging and focused ion beam micromachining. Methods in Cell Biology. 111: 259-281.
Mizuno N, Taschner M, Engel BD, Lorentzen E (2012). Structural studies of ciliary components. Journal of Molecular Biology. 422: 163-180.
Engel BD, Ishikawa H, Feldman JL, Wilson CW, Chuang PT, Snedecor J, Williams J, Sun Z, Marshall WF (2011). A cell-based screen for inhibitors of flagella-driven motility in Chlamydomonas reveals a novel modulator of ciliary length and retrograde actin flow. Cytoskeleton. 68: 188-203.
Engel BD, Ludington WB, Marshall WF (2009). Intraflagellar transport particle size scales inversely with flagellar length: revisiting the balance-point length control model. The Journal of Cell Biology. 187: 81-89.
Engel BD, Lechtreck KF, Sakai T, Ikebe M, Witman GB, Marshall WF (2009). Total internal reflection fluorescence (TIRF) microscopy of Chlamydomonas flagella. Methods in Cell Biology. 93: 155-176.
REFERENCES
Prof. Wolfgang Baumeister
Postdoc Supervisor
Dept. of Molecular Structural Biology
Max Planck Institute of Biochemistry
Am Klopferspitz 18
82152 Martinsried, Germany
Phone: +49 (89) 8578-2642
Fax: +49 (89) 8578-2641
Email: baumeist@biochem.mpg.de
Prof. Wallace Marshall
Ph.D. Supervisor
Dept. of Biochemistry and Biophysics
University of California, San Francisco
600 16th Street
San Francisco, CA 94158
Phone: 415-514-4304
Fax: 415-502-4315
Email: wallace.marshall@ucsf.edu