Associate Professor BA, Chemistry; PhD, Chemistry Office: A308A Life Sciences Contact Phone Number: 542-7922 Lab: A310 Life Sciences Lab Phone: 542-7923 E-mail: urbauer@chem.uga.edu Additional Information / Lab Page

Research Interests

Our research focuses on protein structure and function and protein-protein interactions. We employ an approach combining modern analytical, biophysical and molecular biology techniques, with an emphasis on biomolecular NMR spectroscopy. Our core projects include the study of gene regulation and novel regulators of transcription initiation in bacteria, oxidative stress and calcium signaling, steroid hormone receptor activation, and regulation of biofilm formation and pathogenesis in Pseudomonas aeruginosa. These projects are important fundamentally, and they important biomedically with respect to antibiotic target development, oxidative stress and biological aging, and diseases such as cancer and cystic fibrosis.

Recent Selected Publications

• Slaughter, B. D., Urbauer, R. J., Urbauer, J. L. and Johnson, C. K. (2007) Mechanism of calmodulin recognition of the binding domain of isoform 1b of the plasma membrane Ca2+-ATPase:  Kinetic pathway and effects of methionine oxidation.  Biochemistry 46, 4045-4054.
  
  
• Cowley, A. B., Bieber Urbauer, R. J., and Urbauer, J. L. (2005) 1H, 13C and 15N NMR assignments for AlgH, a putative transcriptional regulator from Pseudomonas aeruginosa.  J. Biomol. NMR 33, 74.
  
  
• Anbanandam, A., Bieber Urbauer, R. J., Bartlett, R. J., Smallwood, H. S., Squier, T. C., and Urbauer, J. L. (2005) Mediating molecular recognition by methionine oxidation:  Conformational switching by oxidation of methionine in the carboxyl-terminal domain of calmodulin.  Biochemistry 44, 9486-9496.
  
  
• Yang, W., Wilkins, A. L., Ye, Y., Liu, Z.-R., Urbauer, J. L., Hellinga, H. W., Kearney, A. van der Merwe, P. A., and Yang, J. J. (2005) Design of a calcium-binding protein with desired structure and cell adhesion function.  J. Am. Chem. Soc. 127, 2085-2093.
  
  
• Bieber Urbauer, R. J., Rosasco, S. E., Gilmore, J. M., Hattle, J. M., Cowley, A. B. and Urbauer, J. L. (2005) Cloning and high-yield overexpression and purification of AlgH, a regulator of alginate biosynthesis in Pseudomonas aeruginosa.  Prot. Expr. Purif. 43, 57-64.
  
  
• Gregory, B., Nickels, B. E., Garrity, S., Severinova, E., Minakhin, L., Bieber Urbauer, R. J., Urbauer, J. L., Heyduk, T., Severinov, K., and Hochschild, A. (2004) A regulator that inhibits transcription by targeting an intersubunit interaction of the RNA polymerase holoenzyme.   Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A. 101, 4554-4559.
  
  
• Osborn, K., Bartlett, R. K., Bieber Urbauer, R. J., Urbauer, J. L., and Johnson, C. K. (2004) Single-molecule dynamics reveal an altered conformation for the autoinhibitor domain of plasma-membrane Ca2+-ATPase bound to oxidatively modified calmodulin.  Biochemistry 43, 12937-12944.
  
  
• Allen, M. W., Bieber Urbauer, R. J., Zaidi, A., Williams, T. D., Urbauer, J. L., and Johnson, C. K. (2004) Fluroescence Labeling, Purification, and Immobilization of a Double Cysteine Mutant Calmodulin Fusion Protein for Single-Molecule Experiments.   Anal. Biochem. 325, 273-284.
  
  
• Zheng, K., Makagiansar, I. T., Wang, M., Urbauer, J. L., Kuczera, K., and Siahaan, T. J. (2004) Expression, purification and structural study of the EC4 domain of E-cadherin.   Protein Expr. and Purif. 33, 72-79.