Mei Hong
Professor of Chemistry

Positions Held

2014 - present Professor, Department of Chemistry
2007 - 2010 John D. Corbet Professorship, Iowa State University (ISU)
2005 - 2014 Professor, Department of Chemistry, ISU
2011 - 2014 Adjunct Professor, Department of Biochemistry, ISU
1999 - 2004 Associate Professor, Department of Chemistry, ISU
1999 - 2002 Assistant Professor, Depatment of Chemistry, ISU
1997 - 1999 Research Assistant Professor, University of Massachusetts Amherst
1996 - 1997 Postdoctoral Fellow, Department of Chemistry, MIT

Awards and Honors

2014 Günther Laukien Prize, Experimental NMR Conference
2013 ISU Award for utstanding Career Achievement in Research
2012 Protein Society Irving Sigal Young Investigator Award
2010 Founders Medal, International Council on Magnetic Resonance in Biological Systems
2010 Fellow, American Association for the Advancement of Science
2007 - 2010 John D. Corbett Professorship
2007 Mid-Career Research Award, IU
2006 Agnes Fay Morgan Research Award, Iota Sigma Pi
2004 Mary Lyon Award, Mount Holyoke College
2003 Early Achievement in Research/Artistic Creativity Award, LAS College, ISU
2002 Alfred P. Sloan Research Fellow, Sloan Foundation
2001 CAREER Award, National Science Foundation
2000 Research Innovation Award, Research Corporation
1999 Beckman Young Investigator Award, Beckman Foundation
1998 POWRE Award, National Science Foundation
1997 National Institute of Health Postdoctoral Fellowship
1992 American Chemical Society Undergraduate Student Award, Mount Holyoke College

Research Interests

My research focuses on the development and applications of solid-state NMR spectroscopy to elucidate the structure and dynamics of membrane proteins and other biological molecules. We are particularly interested in the mechanistic structural biology of ion channels and curvature-inducing membrane proteins. Our research has elucidated 1) the drug binding site and inhibition mechanism of the influenza M2 protein and the proton conduction mechanism of this proton channel, 2) the membrane-bound oligomeric structure of ?-hairpin antimicrobial peptides and the mechanism with which these arginine-rich cationic peptides insert into lipid membranes against the free energy barrier, and 3) the conformational and dynamical changes of a channel-forming colicin during its insertion into the lipid membrane. We also investigate the structure of biomaterials such as plant cell walls.

To enable these biological studies, we develop a wide variety of solid-state NMR techniques, such as 1) multidimensional correlation techniques, computational methods and isotopic labeling strategies for resonance assignment of proteins, 2) anisotropic-isotropic correlation techniques to measure torsion angles, molecular motion, and chemical shift tensors, 3) long-range distance techniques, and 4) intermolecular correlation techniques to determine membrane protein depth of insertion and hydration.

Contact Information:

Department of Chemistry
170 Albany Street, NW14-3212
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Cambridge, MA 02139
Tel. (617) 253-5521
Email: meihong@mit.edu

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