Diyun Sun
Graduate Assistant
BS, Biological Science
Hello, Welcome to my site! I am a graduate assistant in the department of Biochemistry and Biophysics at Texas A&M University. I have strong research interest in molecular mechanism of cellular machinery by structural and computational techniques. Here are you can find some of my recent works.
Structural investigation of mZBP1
(2023.1-Current)
In this project, we aimed to give a structural elucidation on how Z-DNA binding protein1 (ZBP1) mediates the formation of necroptosis complex upon sensing the DNA/RNA.
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We found the optimal stoichiometry for preparation of ZBP1-DNA/RNA complex by FPLC and EMSA. Now we are working on the structure by X-ray crystallography and Cryo-EM.
This work was supervised by Dr. Pingwei Li{link}.
Phylogenetics of promiscuous enzymes
(2022.6-2022.8)
In this project, I constructed a narrowed sequence similarity network based on E-value and neighborhood connectivity to one L-DS. I then predicted nodes function by operon analysis and HMMER search in their genome context, built phylogenetic trees that indicated coevolution of L-DS with other two core enzymes in the pathway.
This work was supervised by Dr. Margaret Glanser {link}.
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Computational Neurobiology
(2021.12-2022.6)
In this project I took advantage of an established voxelwise encoding models, mapping the semantic representations to the cerebellum from the original fMRI data.
I'd like to thank Amanda Lebel{link} in Ivry& Gallant Labs for her instruction all along the project.
Enzyme Rational Design
(2021.2-2021.8)
In this project I was trying to turn the thermophilic PfTrpB into a mesophilic one in order for better application in the cell free system. Characterized with HPLC, I found several beneficial sites on the enzyme loop. The mesophilic PfTrpB presents a more constrained active site than the wild type.
This work was supported when I was an undergraduate intern in Prof. Jian Li's Lab{link}.
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2022 - Current
Texas A&M university
Graduate student at the Department of Biochemistry & Biophysics
2018 - 2022
ShanghaiTech University
BS in Biological Science