Leonid Sazanov

Leonid A. Sazanov FRS is a Professor at the Institute of Science and Technology Austria (IST).[1][2][3] Sazanov research explores the structure and function of large membrane protein complexes from the domain of bioenergetics.[4] These molecular machines interconvert redox energy and proton motive force across biological membranes using a variety of mechanisms.[4]

Leonid Sazanov FRS
Born	Leonid A. Sazanov
Alma mater	Belarusian State University (MSc) Moscow State University (PhD)
Awards	EMBO Member (2018)
Scientific career
Fields	Structural biology Bioenergetics Membrane proteins X-ray crystallography Electron microscopy[1]
Institutions	Institute of Science and Technology Austria MRC Mitochondrial Biology Unit Laboratory of Molecular Biology University of Cambridge Imperial College London University of Birmingham
Website	ist.ac.at/en/research/life-sciences/sazanov-group/

Education

Sazanov was educated at the Belarusian State University[5] and Moscow State University where he was awarded a PhD in 1990.[4]

Career and research

Sazanov is known for the discovery of the first atomic structure of respiratory complex I, using X-ray crystallography and the bacterial enzyme as a model.[4] It is an entry point into the electron transport chain, responsible for most of the energy production in the cell.[4] The complex I structure revealed many unexpected and unique features of this extravagantly elaborate membrane protein assembly. Sazanov then went on to determine the first complete atomic structure of the even larger mammalian mitochondrial complex I, using new cryogenic electron microscopy methods.[4][6][7][8][9]

Sazanov research investigates the coupling mechanism of complex I using a combination of structural and biophysical techniques. He is also interested in the structure and mechanism of other membrane-embedded molecular machines in mitochondria and bacteria.[4][10]

Previously Sazanov served as program leader at the MRC Mitochondrial Biology Unit and research associate at the Medical Research Council (MRC) Laboratory of Molecular Biology.[4] He has been a research fellow at Imperial College London and a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Birmingham.[4]

Award and honours

He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society (FRS) in 2019[4] and a member of the European Molecular Biology Organization (EMBO) in 2018.[11]

References

1. Leonid Sazanov publications indexed by Google Scholar
2. Leonid Sazanov publications from Europe PubMed Central
3. "IST Austria | Sazanov Group".
4. Anon (2019). "Professor Leonid Sazanov FRS". royalsociety.org. London: Royal Society. Archived from the original on 2019-04-24. One or more of the preceding sentences incorporates text from the royalsociety.org website where:

   “All text published under the heading 'Biography' on Fellow profile pages is available under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.” --Royal Society Terms, conditions and policies at the Wayback Machine (archived 2016-11-11)

5. Leonid Sazanov's ORCID 0000-0002-0977-7989
6. Sazanov, L. A. (2006). "Structure of the Hydrophilic Domain of Respiratory Complex I from Thermus thermophilus". Science. 311 (5766): 1430–1436. doi:10.1126/science.1123809. ISSN 0036-8075. PMID 16469879.
7. Efremov, Rouslan G.; Baradaran, Rozbeh; Sazanov, Leonid A. (2010). "The architecture of respiratory complex I". Nature. 465 (7297): 441–445. doi:10.1038/nature09066. ISSN 0028-0836. PMID 20505720.
8. Baradaran, Rozbeh; Berrisford, John M.; Minhas, Gurdeep S.; Sazanov, Leonid A. (2013). "Crystal structure of the entire respiratory complex I". Nature. 494 (7438): 443–448. doi:10.1038/nature11871. ISSN 0028-0836. PMC 3672946. PMID 23417064.
9. Fiedorczuk, Karol (2017). Cryo-electron microscopy studies on ovine mitochondrial complex I. cam.ac.uk (PhD thesis). University of Cambridge. doi:10.17863/CAM.17168. OCLC 1063556549. EThOS uk.bl.ethos.744376.
10. Burrows, P. A. (1998). "Identification of a functional respiratory complex in chloroplasts through analysis of tobacco mutants containing disrupted plastid ndh genes". The EMBO Journal. 17 (4): 868–876. doi:10.1093/emboj/17.4.868. ISSN 1460-2075. PMC 1170436. PMID 9463365.
11. "Find people in the EMBO Communities". people.embo.org.