Graduate Student – Biochemistry

B.S. – Biology, The University of Central Oklahoma

Research

My research focuses on developing tools to allow us to identify the substrates of human sialidases, which are enzymes that catalyze the removal of sialic acid from cellular glycoconjugates. Sialidases are involved in many physiological and pathological processes from immune activation to metastasis yet their substrates remain largely unknown. Identification of sialidase substrates would help us understand how these enzymes exert their effects.

Publications

• Parker, RB, McCombs, JE & Kohler, JJ. Sialidase specificity determined by chemoselective modification of complex sialylated glycans. ACS Chemical Biology (2012) 7: 1509-1514.
• RB Parker & JJ Kohler. “Regulation of intracellular signaling by extracellular glycan remodeling,” ACS Chemical Biology, (2010) 5: 35-46.