Victor J. Hruby 11th Australian Peptide Conference 2015

Victor J. Hruby

Professor Hruby’s research has made significant contributions to chemistry, conformation-biological activity relationships, molecular mechanisms of information transduction and of molecular diseases associated with peptide hormones and neurotransmitters and their receptors that modulate health, disease and human behavior. Specific methods and approaches used in this research include: de novo design of biologically active peptides and peptidomimetics; peptide and peptidomimetic synthesis; asymmetric synthesis; design and asymmetric synthesis of novel amino acids; computational chemistry; conformational analysis using NMR, X-ray crystallography and other biophysical tools; combinatorial chemistry; conformation-biological activity relationships; the design, synthesis and biological evaluation of peptide and peptide mimetic ligands that affect pain, addictions, feeding behaviors, pigmentation, sexual behavior and motivation, glucose homeostasis, cancer and other biological effects; peptide mimetic design; and the structure-function of G-protein coupled receptors. The Hruby group also has developed new synthetic methodologies for the assembly of multimeric ligands for the detection and treatment of pain, cancer and other diseases; a new approach to design of ligands for disease states involving the concept of overlapping pharmacophores to address several receptors simultaneously in a single molecular ligand. Victor Hruby has received numerous awards and honors, including a Guggenheim Fellowship (1984), the Alan E. Pierce Award (now the Merrifield Award) (1993), a Senior Humboldt Fellowship (1999-2000), the American Chemical Society Ralph F. Hirschmann Award (2002), the ACS Arthur C. Cope Scholar Award (2009), the Murray Goodman Award (2011), the ACS Medicinal Chemistry Hall of Fame (2012) and the Meienhofer Award (2012).