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35 East 12th Street, Holland, MI 49423-3605
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SEMINAR SPEAKER: Dr. Sarah Krueger, Mount St. Mary's University
TITLE: “The Power of Synthesis: Building Potential Therapeutic Agents for Huntington’s Disease”
ABSTRACT: Targeting nucleic acids with small molecules that bind disease-causing sequences with high affinity and selectivity represents a promising strategy for therapeutic development. This approach is particularly attractive for diseases that remain difficult to target at the protein level, including Huntington’s disease. Although nucleic acid-targeting therapeutics have significant potential, the efficient synthesis of candidate molecules is a critical early step in the drug discovery process. This talk will discuss the development of practical, scalable synthetic methods that enable access to novel small molecules designed to target nucleic acids, enabling their evaluation as potential therapeutic agents.
BIO: Sarah Krueger earned her B.S. in Chemistry and Biochemistry from Mount St. Mary’s University and her Ph.D. in chemistry from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign under the mentorship of Dr. Steve Zimmerman. During her Ph.D. studies, she enjoyed a summer at Hope College working with Dr. Johnson as a visiting graduate student. She joined the Mount St. Mary’s faculty in 2022, where her research group works in two fields: understanding the interactions between small molecules and nucleic acids and developing evidence-based practices for teaching organic chemistry. In the classroom and the research laboratory, Dr. Krueger is passionate about helping to make science, and higher education in general, welcoming and safe for everyone. Outside of work, she enjoys reading, hiking, and spending time with her family.
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