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Department of Chemistry & Biochemistry Faculty

Teaching

CHEM 422 General Biochemistry Laboratory
CHEM 542 Nucleic Acid Biochemistry
CHEM 505A/B Graduate Seminar

Education

Postdoctoral University of California, Los Angeles, CA
Postdoctoral Univeristy of Utah, Salt Lake City, Utah
Ph.D. Loyola University Chicago, Chicago, Illinois
M. Sc. St. Joseph's College, Bangalore, India
B. Sc. St. Joseph's College, Bangalore, India

Research Interests

Ionic manganese (i-Mn or Mn) is both an essential nutrient and a toxic metal ion and hence its concentration has to be carefully maintained inside a cell. Yet, little is known about how Mn is acquired, handled, and stored. In several unicellular organisms, i-Mn has been shown to compensate for the lack of the antioxidant enzyme, superoxide dismutase. In the simple multi-cellular organism, Caenorhabditis elegans, we have observed that i-Mn supplementation increases resistance to reactive oxygen species (ROS) and extends lifespan. It is unclear how Mn exerts its antioxidant-like activity. Our lab is interested in identifying the molecular basis for the antioxidant-like activity and to increase our understanding of Mn metabolism in C. elegans.

Recent Publications

Munroe, W., Kingsley, C., Durazo, A., Gralla, E. B., Imlay, J. A., Srinivasan, C., and Valentine, J. S. (2007) Only one of a wide assortment of manganese-containing SOD mimicking compounds rescues the slow aerobic growth phenotypes of both Escherichia coli and Saccharomyces cerevisiae strains lacking superoxide dismutase enzymes. J Inorg Biochem., 101(11-12):1875-82. 

Pate, K., Rangel, N., Fraser, B., Clement, M. H. S., and Srinivasan, C. (2006)  Measuring “Free" Iron Levels in Caenorhabditis elegans Using Low-temperature Fe(III) Electron Paramagnetic Resonance Spectroscopy.  Anal. Biochem., 358(2):199-207.

Lin, Y., Hoang, H., Hsieh, S. I., Rangel, N., Foster, A. L., Sampayo, J. N., Lithgow, G. J., and Srinivasan, C. (2006)  Manganous Ion Supplementation Accelerates Wild-Type Development, Enhances Stress Resistance and Rescues the Life-Span of a Short–Lived Caenorhabditis elegans Mutant.  Free Radic. Biol. Med., 40: 1185-93.

Sanchez, R. J., Srinivasan, C., Wallace, M. A., Martins, J., Munroe, W. H., Kao, T. Y., Le, K., Valentine, J. S.  (2005)  Exogenous Manganous Ion at Millimolar Levels Rescues All Known Defects of Yeast Lacking Copper-Zinc Superoxide Dismutase.  J. Bioinorg. Chem 10: 913-23.

Jensen, L. T., Sanchez, R. J., Srinivasan, C., Valentine, J. S. & Culotta, V. C. (2004)  Mutations in Saccharomyces cerevisiae iron sulfur cluster assembly genes and oxidative stress relevant to Cu/Zn superoxide dismutase.  J Biol Chem. 279(29): 29938-43.

Srinivasan, C. & Gralla, E. B. (2002)  Measurement of "free" or electron paramagnetic resonance-detectable iron in whole yeast cells as indicator of superoxide stress.  Methods Enzymol 349, 173-80.

Wei, J. P., Srinivasan, C., Han, H., Valentine, J. S. & Gralla, E. B. (2001)  Evidence for a novel role of copper-zinc superoxide dismutase in zinc metabolism.  J Biol Chem 276, 44798-803.

Minadeo, N., Layden, B., Amari, L. V., Thomas, V., Radloff, K., Srinivasan, C., Hamm, H. E. & de Freitas, D. M. (2001)  Effect of Li+ upon the Mg2+-dependent activation of recombinant Gialpha1.  Arch Biochem Biophys 388, 7-12.