Image: Tony Szempruch was selected as a 2016 Kaluza Prize winner. The Kaluza Prize is given by the American Society for Cell Biology (ASCB) in collaboration with Beckman Coulter Life Sciences to honor academic excellence in graduate student research. He won this award based on work in Steve Hajduk’s lab in the Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology at the University of Georgia. (Click on heading to continue reading). In studies on African trypanosomes, the cause of human African sleeping sickness, he discovered that these parasites release extracellular vesicles that transfer virulence factors between parasites and can interact with host cells to cause pathology. His discoveries offer opportunities to develop new strategies for diagnosis and treatment of diseases caused by trypanosomes. Dr. Szempruch will receive a cash prize of $1,000, a travel award to attend the 2016 ASCB meeting in San Francisco, and will be recognized at a special presentation before the Keith Porter Lecture. Dr. Szempruch will also present a talk at the Kaluza Scientific Minisymposium during the meeting. Dr. Szempruch is currently a postdoctoral fellow in the laboratory of Mitch Guttman at CalTech.
