In "Interphase human chromosome exhibits out of equilibrium glassy dynamics", just published in Nature Communications, Guang Shi (lead author and graduate student, Biophysics Program) with Dave Thirumalai (IPST Visiting Professor) and Changbong Hyeon (Korea Institute for Advanced Study) have mapped the movement of a chromosome for the first time, using computer modeling to show how billions of base pairs of DNA get packed into an impossibly small space without getting tangled.

Tsung-Jen Liao, biophysics Ph.D. student and NCI-UMD Partnership student, published a first-author paper titled "Allosteric KRas4B Can Modulate SOS1 Fast and Slow Ras Activation Cycles" in Biophysical Journal on July 24, 2018. Paper co-authors included NIH's Ruth Nussinov and UMD Professor of Chemistry & Biochemistry David Fushman. 

Simona Patange, a biophysics graduate student in the NCI-UMD Partnership, talks about what it's like to be a graduate student at two institutions and what it's like to do research at the NIH, where postdoctoral fellows and staff scientists far outnumber the student population.

Simona Patange, a biophysics graduate student in the NCI-UMD Partnership, talks about how Ph.D. students can conduct dissertation research at NIH as a formal partnership with his or her graduate institution.

After 30 years at UMD, Distinguished University Professor Devarajan "Dave" Thirumalai (IPST / Chemistry) has moved to the University of Texas at Austin, to become the Chair of the Department of Chemistry. 

David Fushman, Professor in the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry and Interim Associate Director of the Maryland Biophysics Program, and Sergei I. Sukharev, Professor in the Department of Biology and Interim Director of the Maryland Biophysics Graduate Program, were considered by IPST faculty in February 2015 for appointment as Affiliate Professors in IPST. Both candidates’ nominations were unanimously approved by the Institute’s faculty. Congratulations and welcome to the Institute for Physical Science and Technology to both of them.

Sergei Sukharev has been appointed Interim Director of the Maryland Biophysics Program for the coming year. Sukharev is a Professor of Biology, and has served as the Associate Director of the Maryland Biophysics Program. His research focuses on mechanosensitive ion channels, which convert mechanical forces into electrical or chemical signals in cells. He and the members of his research group study these channels using a combination of experimental approaches and computational modeling.