Erdal Toprak, Ph.D. Associate Professor Endowed Title Southwestern Medical Foundation Scholar in Biomedical Research School Medical School Department Pharmacology | Lyda Hill Department of Bioinformatics Graduate Programs Biomedical Engineering, Molecular Biophysics Biography Download Curriculum Vitae Erdal Toprak received his Ph.D. in Computational Biology and Biophysics in 2007 from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign where he studied motility mechanisms of molecular motor proteins with Paul R. Selvin. He then moved to Roy Kishony's Lab at Harvard Medical School as a postdoctoral research fellow and studied evolution of antibiotic resistance. Research Interest Antibiotic Resistance and Sensitivity Bacterial efflux pumps Evolvable antimicrobials Protein evolution Single Molecule Biophysics Publications Featured Publications Fighting against evolution of antibiotic resistance by utilizing evolvable antimicrobial drugs. Cansizoglu MF, Toprak E Curr. Genet. 2017 May Sequence-Specific Targeting of Bacterial Resistance Genes Increases Antibiotic Efficacy. Ayhan DH, Tamer YT, Akbar M, Bailey SM, Wong M, Daly SM, Greenberg DE, Toprak E PLoS Biol. 2016 Sep 14 9 e1002552 Delayed commitment to evolutionary fate in antibiotic resistance fitness landscapes. Palmer AC, Toprak E, Baym M, Kim S, Veres A, Bershtein S, Kishony R Nat Commun 2015 6 7385 Strength of Selection Pressure Is an Important Parameter Contributing to the Complexity of Antibiotic Resistance Evolution. Oz T, Guvenek A, Yildiz S, Karaboga E, Tamer YT, Mumcuyan N, Ozan VB, Senturk GH, Cokol M, Yeh P, Toprak E Mol. Biol. Evol. 2014 Jun Building a morbidostat: an automated continuous-culture device for studying bacterial drug resistance under dynamically sustained drug inhibition. Toprak E, Veres A, Yildiz S, Pedraza JM, Chait R, Paulsson J, Kishony R Nat Protoc 2013 Mar 8 3 555-67 Evolutionary paths to antibiotic resistance under dynamically sustained drug selection. Toprak E, Veres A, Michel JB, Chait R, Hartl DL, Kishony R Nat. Genet. 2012 Jan 44 1 101-5 On the Race to Starvation: How Do Bacteria Survive High Doses of Antibiotics? Tamer YT, Toprak E Mol. Cell 2017 Dec 68 6 1019-1021 Increased substrate affinity in the Escherichia coli L28R dihydrofolate reductase mutant causes trimethoprim resistance. Abdizadeh H, Tamer YT, Acar O, Toprak E, Atilgan AR, Atilgan C Phys Chem Chem Phys 2017 Apr Mechanical slowing-down of cytoplasmic diffusion allows in vivo counting of proteins in individual cells. Okumus B, Landgraf D, Lai GC, Bakhsi S, Arias-Castro JC, Yildiz S, Huh D, Fernandez-Lopez R, Peterson CN, Toprak E, El Karoui M, Paulsson J Nat Commun 2016 7 11641 Quantifying the Determinants of Evolutionary Dynamics Leading to Drug Resistance. Chevereau G, Dravecká M, Batur T, Guvenek A, Ayhan DH, Toprak E, Bollenbach T PLoS Biol. 2015 Nov 13 11 e1002299 Results 1-10 of 20 1 2 Next Last Honors & Awards Southwestern Medical Foundation Scholar in Biomedical Research (2014-2019) EMBO Installation Grant (2013-2018) Human Frontiers Science Program Research Grant (2013-2016) The Young Scientist Award by the Turkish Academy of Sciences (TÜBA) (2013-2016) Marie Curie Career Integration Grant (CIG) (2012-2016) Eugene Rabinowitch Graduate Fellowship (2007) UIUC "Teachers Ranked Excellent by Their Students" (2007)
