Katharina L. Duerr PhD

Katharina studied biochemistry in Frankfurt (Germany) and graduated with honors in 2003. Following a year in cancer research at the University Childrens’ Hospital Ulm (Germany) under the mentorship of Prof Simone Fulda, she pursued her PhD studies with Prof Bamberg and Prof Friedrich at the Max-Planck-Institute of Biophysics in Frankfurt and at the Technical University of Berlin.
Her PhD work focused on the ion transport of electrogenic and electroneutral P-type ATPases, investigating the functional significance of accessory b-subunits for pump activity by voltage clamp fluorometry and atomic absorption spectroscopy. After graduating summa cum laude in 2009, she joined the lab of Dr Eric Gouaux at the Vollum Institute, Oregon Health & Science University in Portland, OR (USA). In her postdoctoral research she studied ionotropic glutamate receptors using a combination of X-ray crystallography, electrophysiology and single-particle cryo-electron microscopy. In 2016, she returned to Europe to become a group leader at the SGC Oxford.