Elias Lolis, PhD
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About
Titles
Professor of Pharmacology
Faculty Director, Office for Postdoctoral AffairsBiography
Elias Lolis received a BA degree in Chemistry at Columbia College and PhD in Chemistry from MIT training in structural biology. His postdoctoral training was in the Laboratory of Medical Biochemistry at Rockefeller University studying the functional interactions between advanced glycation endproducts (AGEs) and the immune system. He currently studies the mechanism of chemokines, the macrophage migration inhibitory factor (MIF) family of proteins, and their receptors in disease (cancer, inflammation, and infection) using structural biology, Crispr/Cas9 in mouse models of disease, and high throughput screening of small molecules as well as designing biotherapeutics. He received a Pharmaceutical Manufacturers Association Faculty Development Award in Basic Pharmacology, the Donaghue Young Investigator Award, and the GlaxoWellcome Award in Drug Discovery. He is the founder and co-founder of the Yale Macromolecular X-ray Facility and Yale Keck Bioinformatics Resource, respectively. More than 25 postdoctoral associates, seven PhD students, two postgrads, seven Yale undergraduates, ten under-represented minority summer students (BioStep and PREP), and 22 undergraduates and high school students from other schools were trained by him or his senior staff. He has been involved in the recruitment of under-represented minorities ever since he was an Assistant Professor traveling to various schools and conferences and, more recently, was a member of various committees of the 2020-21 and 2021-22 Intersections Science Fellows Symposium. He also serves as the Faculty Director of the Office for Postdoctoral Affairs for the University, his department's Director of Graduate Studies, and his department's Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Committee, and mentors students and postdocs in his research lab.
Appointments
Pharmacology
ProfessorPrimary
Other Departments & Organizations
- Biochemistry, Quantitative Biology, Biophysics and Structural Biology (BQBS)
- Developmental Therapeutics
- Lolis Lab
- Molecular Medicine, Pharmacology, and Physiology
- Pharmacology
- Primary Faculty
- Structural Biology
- Yale Cancer Center
- Yale Combined Program in the Biological and Biomedical Sciences (BBS)
- Yale Ventures
Education & Training
- Postdoc
- Rockefeller University (1991)
- PhD
- Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Biochemistry/Chemistry (1989)
- BA
- Columbia College (1984)
Research
Overview
We are generally interested in understanding the biology, structure, mechanism of action, and pharmacology (inhibition) of proteins in physiology and pathophysiology. Our studies are multidisciplinary and include structural biology (X-ray crystallography or NMR), molecular dynamics, high throughput screening (HPTS) and/or inhibitor design, mutational analysis, the use of strains of yeast expressing functional chemokine receptors for signaling and HTPS, and Crispr/Cas mice as a model system for models of disease.
Specific projects include:
1. Chemokine-chemokine receptor (GPCR) structures
2. High throughput screening to identify small molecule agonists and antagonists of chemokines and their GPCR receptors
3. Yeast genetics to identify and quantitate chemokine-chemokine receptor interactions
4. Mechanism of receptor activation for macrophage migration inhibitory factor
5. Identification of the substrate of MIF and structure of MIF-ligand complexes
6. Study of antagonists receptors in disease models
7. Co-crystal structures of other protein-inhibitors complexes
Medical Subject Headings (MeSH)
Links & Media
News
- July 09, 2024
Yale Researchers Pave Way To Target Autoimmune Disease-Associated Gene Variant
- July 24, 2023
Lin Leng, Senior Research Scientist in Medicine (Rheumatology), Retires
- May 01, 2018
A Pathway Towards Better Therapies for T-Cell Lymphoma
- November 18, 2014
The 4th Yale Biophysics & Structural Biology Symposium
Get In Touch
Contacts
Pharmacology
PO Box 208066, 333 Cedar Street
New Haven, CT 06520-8066
United States