Radical SAM Enzymes

Vahe Bandarian (b. 1970) received his BS degree in Biochemistry from the California State University in Los Angeles in 1992 working with Scott Grover on kinetic studies of phosphoenolpyruvate carboxylase. He received his PhD in Biochemistry in 1998 from the University of Wisconsin-Madison working under the direction of George Reed carrying out electron paramagnetic studies of the cobalamin-dependent enzyme ethanolamine ammonia-lyase. After carrying out postdoctoral studies with Rowena Matthews on the cobalamin-dependnet methionine synthase at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor he joined the faculty of the Department of Biochemistry at the University of Arizona in 2003. In 2015 he moved as Professor of Chemistry to the University of Utah. Vahe’s lab studies biosynthetic pathways to natural products that include modified nucleic acids and peptides. His contributions have been recognized by a Burroughs Wellcome Career Award in Biomedical Sciences and the Pfizer Award in Enzyme Chemistry by the Division of Biological Chemistry at ACS.