Dr Chen’s research aims to understand the molecular details of how phosphatases, kinases and their associated proteins regulate cell signaling and homeostasis.
In 2011, Dr Chen completed his PhD on structural studies of macrophage proteins in Professor Jennifer Martin’s laboratory at The University of Queensland’s Institute for Molecular Bioscience.
In 2012, Dr Chen secured a postdoctoral research position at Academia Sinica (Taipei, Taiwan) to work on the molecular insights of phosphatases and kinases interaction using the combination of X-ray crystallography, small-angle X-ray scattering and chemical cross-linking coupled with mass spectrometry.
In 2015, he also received the Outstanding Young Postdoctoral Research Award from the Biophysics Society of Republic of China (Taiwan).
In June 2016, Dr Chen joined Associate Professor Brett Collins’ group at IMB, where he is working to understand how lipid kinases and lipid-binding proteins are involved in the regulation of cellular membrane transport.
Journal Article: Structure of the endosomal Commander complex linked to Ritscher-Schinzel syndrome
Healy, Michael D., McNally, Kerrie E., Butkovič, Rebeka, Chilton, Molly, Kato, Kohji, Sacharz, Joanna, McConville, Calum, Moody, Edmund R. R., Shaw, Shrestha, Planelles-Herrero, Vicente J., Yadav, Sathish K. N., Ross, Jennifer, Borucu, Ufuk, Palmer, Catherine S., Chen, Kai-En, Croll, Tristan I., Hall, Ryan J., Caruana, Nikeisha J., Ghai, Rajesh, Nguyen, Thi H. D., Heesom, Kate J., Saitoh, Shinji, Berger, Imre, Schaffitzel, Christiane, Williams, Tom A., Stroud, David A., Derivery, Emmanuel, Collins, Brett M. and Cullen, Peter J. (2023). Structure of the endosomal Commander complex linked to Ritscher-Schinzel syndrome. Cell, 186 (10), 2219-2237.e29. doi: 10.1016/j.cell.2023.04.003
Journal Article: SNX27–Retromer directly binds ESCPE-1 to transfer cargo proteins during endosomal recycling
Simonetti, Boris, Guo, Qian, Giménez-Andrés, Manuel, Chen, Kai-En, Moody, Edmund R. R., Evans, Ashley J., Chandra, Mintu, Danson, Chris M., Williams, Tom A., Collins, Brett M. and Cullen, Peter J. (2022). SNX27–Retromer directly binds ESCPE-1 to transfer cargo proteins during endosomal recycling. PLoS Biology, 20 (4) e3001601, e3001601. doi: 10.1371/journal.pbio.3001601
Journal Article: Towards a generic prototyping approach for therapeutically-relevant peptides and proteins in a cell-free translation system
Wu, Yue, Cui, Zhenling, Huang, Yen-Hua, de Veer, Simon J., Aralov, Andrey V., Guo, Zhong, Moradi, Shayli V., Hinton, Alexandra O., Deuis, Jennifer R., Guo, Shaodong, Chen, Kai-En, Collins, Brett M., Vetter, Irina, Herzig, Volker, Jones, Alun, Cooper, Matthew A., King, Glenn F., Craik, David J., Alexandrov, Kirill and Mureev, Sergey (2022). Towards a generic prototyping approach for therapeutically-relevant peptides and proteins in a cell-free translation system. Nature Communications, 13 (1) 260, 260. doi: 10.1038/s41467-021-27854-9
(2018–2019) Dementia Australia Research Foundation
Structural Characterisation of Endosomal Trafficking Protein Sorting Nexin 27
Doctor Philosophy
Structure of the endosomal Commander complex linked to Ritscher-Schinzel syndrome
Healy, Michael D., McNally, Kerrie E., Butkovič, Rebeka, Chilton, Molly, Kato, Kohji, Sacharz, Joanna, McConville, Calum, Moody, Edmund R. R., Shaw, Shrestha, Planelles-Herrero, Vicente J., Yadav, Sathish K. N., Ross, Jennifer, Borucu, Ufuk, Palmer, Catherine S., Chen, Kai-En, Croll, Tristan I., Hall, Ryan J., Caruana, Nikeisha J., Ghai, Rajesh, Nguyen, Thi H. D., Heesom, Kate J., Saitoh, Shinji, Berger, Imre, Schaffitzel, Christiane, Williams, Tom A., Stroud, David A., Derivery, Emmanuel, Collins, Brett M. and Cullen, Peter J. (2023). Structure of the endosomal Commander complex linked to Ritscher-Schinzel syndrome. Cell, 186 (10), 2219-2237.e29. doi: 10.1016/j.cell.2023.04.003
SNX27–Retromer directly binds ESCPE-1 to transfer cargo proteins during endosomal recycling
Simonetti, Boris, Guo, Qian, Giménez-Andrés, Manuel, Chen, Kai-En, Moody, Edmund R. R., Evans, Ashley J., Chandra, Mintu, Danson, Chris M., Williams, Tom A., Collins, Brett M. and Cullen, Peter J. (2022). SNX27–Retromer directly binds ESCPE-1 to transfer cargo proteins during endosomal recycling. PLoS Biology, 20 (4) e3001601, e3001601. doi: 10.1371/journal.pbio.3001601
Wu, Yue, Cui, Zhenling, Huang, Yen-Hua, de Veer, Simon J., Aralov, Andrey V., Guo, Zhong, Moradi, Shayli V., Hinton, Alexandra O., Deuis, Jennifer R., Guo, Shaodong, Chen, Kai-En, Collins, Brett M., Vetter, Irina, Herzig, Volker, Jones, Alun, Cooper, Matthew A., King, Glenn F., Craik, David J., Alexandrov, Kirill and Mureev, Sergey (2022). Towards a generic prototyping approach for therapeutically-relevant peptides and proteins in a cell-free translation system. Nature Communications, 13 (1) 260, 260. doi: 10.1038/s41467-021-27854-9
Chen, Kai-En, Guo, Qian, Hill, Timothy A., Cui, Yi, Kendall, Amy K., Yang, Zhe, Hall, Ryan J., Healy, Michael D., Sacharz, Joanna, Norwood, Suzanne J., Fonseka, Sachini, Xie, Boyang, Reid, Robert C., Leneva, Natalya, Parton, Robert G., Ghai, Rajesh, Stroud, David A., Fairlie, David P, Suga, Hiroaki, Jackson, Lauren P., Teasdale, Rohan D., Passioura, Toby and Collins, Brett M. (2021). De novo macrocyclic peptides for inhibiting, stabilizing, and probing the function of the retromer endosomal trafficking complex. Science Advances, 7 (49) eabg4007, eabg4007. doi: 10.1126/sciadv.abg4007
Sharma, Gagan, Braga, Carolyne B., Chen, Kai-En, Jia, Xinying, Ramanujam, Venkatraman, Collins, Brett M., Rittner, Roberto and Mobli, Mehdi (2021). Structural basis for the binding of the cancer targeting scorpion toxin, ClTx, to the vascular endothelia growth factor receptor neuropilin-1. Current Research in Structural Biology, 3, 179-186. doi: 10.1016/j.crstbi.2021.07.003
Community-wide experimental evaluation of the PROSS stability-design method
Peleg, Yoav, Vincentelli, Renaud, Collins, Brett M., Chen, Kai-En, Livingstone, Emma K., Weeratunga, Saroja, Leneva, Natalya, Guo, Qian, Remans, Kim, Perez, Kathryn, Bjerga, Gro E K, Larsen, Øivind, Vaněk, Ondřej, Skořepa, Ondřej, Jacquemin, Sophie, Poterszman, Arnaud, Kjær, Svend, Christodoulou, Evangelos, Albeck, Shira, Dym, Orly, Ainbinder, Elena, Unger, Tamar, Schuetz, Anja, Matthes, Susann, Bader, Michael, de Marco, Ario, Storici, Paola, Semrau, Marta S., Stolt-Bergner, Peggy ... Fleishman, Sarel J. (2021). Community-wide experimental evaluation of the PROSS stability-design method. Journal of Molecular Biology, 433 (13) 166964, 166964. doi: 10.1016/j.jmb.2021.166964
Neuropilin-1 is a host factor for SARS-CoV-2 infection
Daly, James L., Simonetti, Boris, Klein, Katja, Chen, Kai-En, Williamson, Maia Kavanagh, Antón-Plágaro, Carlos, Shoemark, Deborah K., Simón-Gracia, Lorena, Bauer, Michael, Hollandi, Reka, Greber, Urs F., Horvath, Peter, Sessions, Richard B., Helenius, Ari, Hiscox, Julian A., Teesalu, Tambet, Matthews, David A., Davidson, Andrew D., Collins, Brett M., Cullen, Peter J. and Yamauchi, Yohei (2020). Neuropilin-1 is a host factor for SARS-CoV-2 infection. Science, 370 (6518), 861-865. doi: 10.1126/science.abd3072
Ugrankar, Rupali, Bowerman, Jade, Hariri, Hanaa, Chandra, Mintu, Chen, Kevin, Bossanyi, Marie-France, Datta, Sanchari, Rogers, Sean, Eckert, Kaitlyn M., Vale, Gonçalo, Victoria, Alexia, Fresquez, Joseph, McDonald, Jeffrey G., Jean, Steve, Collins, Brett M. and Henne, W. Mike (2019). Drosophila snazarus regulates a lipid droplet population at plasma membrane-droplet contacts in adipocytes. Developmental Cell, 50 (5), 557-572.e5. doi: 10.1016/j.devcel.2019.07.021
Towards a molecular understanding of endosomal trafficking by Retromer and Retriever
Chen, Kai‐En, Healy, Michael D. and Collins, Brett M. (2019). Towards a molecular understanding of endosomal trafficking by Retromer and Retriever. Traffic, 20 (7) tra.12649, 465-478. doi: 10.1111/tra.12649
Chandra, Mintu, Chin, Yanni K.-Y., Mas, Caroline, Feathers, J. Ryan, Paul, Blessy, Datta, Sanchari, Chen, Kai-En, Jia, Xinying, Yang, Zhe, Norwood, Suzanne J., Mohanty, Biswaranjan, Bugarcic, Andrea, Teasdale, Rohan D., Henne, W. Mike, Mobli, Mehdi and Collins, Brett M. (2019). Classification of the human phox homology (PX) domains based on their phosphoinositide binding specificities. Nature Communications, 10 (1) 1528, 1528. doi: 10.1038/s41467-019-09355-y
Chen, Kai-En, Tillu, Vikas A., Chandra, Mintu and Collins, Brett M. (2018). Molecular basis for membrane recruitment by the PX and C2 domains of Class II Phosphoinositide 3-Kinase-C2α. Structure, 26 (12), 1612-1625.e4. doi: 10.1016/j.str.2018.08.010
Structural insights into the architecture and membrane interactions of the conserved COMMD proteins
Healy, Michael D., Hospenthal, Manuela K., Hall, Ryan J., Chandra, Mintu, Chilton, Molly, Tillu, Vikas, Chen, Kai-En, Celligoi, Dion J., McDonald, Fiona J., Cullen, Peter J., Lott, J. Shaun, Collins, Brett M. and Ghai, Rajesh (2018). Structural insights into the architecture and membrane interactions of the conserved COMMD proteins. eLife, 7 e35898. doi: 10.7554/elife.35898
Substrate specificity and plasticity of FERM-containing protein tyrosine phosphatases
Chen, Kai-En, Li, Meng-Yen, Chou, Chia-Cheng, Ho, Meng-Ru, Chen, Guang-Chao, Meng, Tzu-Ching and Wang, Andrew H. -J. (2015). Substrate specificity and plasticity of FERM-containing protein tyrosine phosphatases. Structure, 23 (4), 653-664. doi: 10.1016/j.str.2015.01.017
Reciprocal allosteric regulation of p38γ and PTPN3 involves a PDZ domain-modulated complex formation
Chen, Kai-En, Lin, Shu-Yu, Wu, Mei-Ju, Ho, Meng-Ru, Santhanam, Abirami, Chou, Chia-Cheng, Meng, Tzu-Ching and Wang, Andrew H. -J. (2014). Reciprocal allosteric regulation of p38γ and PTPN3 involves a PDZ domain-modulated complex formation. Science Signaling, 7 (347), ra98-ra98. doi: 10.1126/scisignal.2005722
Science signaling podcast: 14 October 2014
Meng, Tzu-Ching, Chen, Kai-En, Wang, Andrew H.-J. and Van Hook, Annalisa M. (2014). Science signaling podcast: 14 October 2014. Science Signaling, 7 (347), pc28-pc28. doi: 10.1126/scisignal.2005939
Chen, Kai-En, Richards, Ayanthi A., Caradoc-Davies, Tom T., Vajjhala, Parimala R., Robin, Gautier, Lua, Linda H. L., Hill, Justine M., Schroder, Kate, Sweet, Matthew J., Kellie, Stuart, Kobe, Bostjan and Martin, Jennifer (2013). The structure of the caspase recruitment domain of BinCARD reveals that all three cysteines can be oxidized. Acta Crystallographica Section D: Biological Crystallography, 69 (5), 774-784. doi: 10.1107/S0907444913001558
Walden, Patricia M., Heras, Begona, Chen, Kai-En, Halili, Maria A., Rimmer, Kieran, Sharma, Pooja, Scanlon, Martin J. and Martin, Jennifer L. (2012). The 1.2 A resolution crystal structure of TcpG, the Vibrio cholerae DsbA disulfide-forming protein required for pilus and cholera-toxin production. Acta Crystallographica Section D-Biological Crystallography, 68 (10), 1290-1302. doi: 10.1107/S0907444912026388
Christie, Michelle P., Whitten, Andrew E., King, Gordon J., Hu, Shu-Hong, Jarrott, Russell J., Chen, Kai-En, Duff, Anthony P., Callow, Philip, Collins, Brett M., James, David E. and Martin, Jennifer L. (2012). Low-resolution solution structures of Munc18: Syntaxin protein complexes indicate an open binding mode driven by the Syntaxin N-peptide. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 109 (25), 9816-9821. doi: 10.1073/pnas.1116975109
The mammalian DUF59 protein Fam96a forms two distinct types of domain-swapped dimer
Chen, Kai-En, Richards, Ayanthi A., Arrifin, Juliana K., Ross, Ian L., Sweet, Matthew J., Kellie, Stuart, Kobe, Bostjan and Martin, Jennifer L. (2012). The mammalian DUF59 protein Fam96a forms two distinct types of domain-swapped dimer. Acta Crystallographica Section D: Biological Crystallography, 68 (6), 637-648. doi: 10.1107/S0907444912006592
Backbone resonance assignments of the monomeric DUF59 domain of human Fam96a
Mas, Caroline, Chen, Kai-En, Brereton, Ian M., Martin, Jennifer L. and Hill, Justine M. (2012). Backbone resonance assignments of the monomeric DUF59 domain of human Fam96a. Biomolecular NMR Assignments, 7 (2), 117-120. doi: 10.1007/s12104-012-9390-1
Interaction between plate make and protein in protein crystallisation screening
King, Gordon J., Chen, Kai-En, Robin, Gautier, Forwood, Jade K., Heras, Begoña, Thakur, Anil S., Kobe, Bostjan, Blomberg, Simon P. and Martin, Jennifer L. (2009). Interaction between plate make and protein in protein crystallisation screening. PLoS One, 4 (11) e7851, x-x. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0007851
(2018–2019) Dementia Australia Research Foundation
Structural Characterisation of Endosomal Trafficking Protein Sorting Nexin 27
Doctor Philosophy — Associate Advisor
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