Mavis Agbandje-McKenna, Ph.D.
Professor of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology
College of Medicine
2010 Awardee

The Parvoviridae projects, funded by several grants from NSF and NIH, include basic science studies aimed at deciphering fundamental mechanisms of successful capsid disassembly/assembly, genome packaging, host tropism, and pathogenicity (NSF), as well as studies aimed at improving the efficacy of Adeno-associated virus (AAV) vectors, a gene delivery system that has shown great promise for therapeutic applications (NIH). Several of Agbandje-McKenna’s NIH grants are in collaboration with investigators working to improve the efficacy of AAV vectors through capsid manipulation. As the national and international “go to” lab for AAV structure information, Agbandje-McKenna has published several collaborative papers with top scientists in the field in high impact journals including J. Virology, J. Biological Chemistry, J. Immunology, J. Structural Biology, Molecular Therapy, PNAS, and Virology.
The Maize streak virus serves as her model for understanding the assembly of the unique plant Geminiviridae capsid, funded by NSF. These viruses are responsible for major yield losses in food crops worldwide. Despite efforts to engineer resistant plants, infectious outbreaks are still prevalent. Agbandje-McKenna is adopting a structure-based approach towards generating molecules/peptides that would disrupt the assembly of the geminate capsid as a means of virus control. Outcomes of this project have been published in Virology.