Professor Valerie Mizrahi PhD (UCT) OMS MASSAf FRSSAf FAAM Fellow of UCT
MRC/NHLS/UCT Molecular Mycobacteriology Research Unit
DST/NRF Centre of Excellence for Biomedical TB Research
Director and Full Member, Institute of Infectious Disease and Molecular Medicine; Director, SAMRC/NHLS/UCT Molecular Mycobacteriology Research Unit (MMRU) which constitutes the UCT node of the DST/NRF Centre of Excellence for Biomedical TB Research (CBTBR); Division of Medical Microbiology, Department of Pathology, Faculty of Health Sciences, University of Cape Town; former Senior International Research Scholar, Howard Hughes Medical Institute, USA (to October 2017).
Received the L'Oréal-UNESCO Award for Women in Science (2000); the Gold Medal from the South African Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology for her contributions to the field (2006); the Department of Science and Technology's Distinguished Woman Scientist Award (2006); named to the Order of Mapungubwe (2007); awarded the Institut de France's Christophe Mérieux Prize for her work in tuberculosis research (2013), and the Platinum Medal of the SAMRC for lifetime contributions to medical research in South Africa (2017).
Research in the MMRU is focused on aspects of mycobacterial physiology and metabolism of relevance to tuberculosis drug discovery, drug resistance, mycobacterial persistence and tuberculosis transmission. Currently, the Unit is actively involved in studying mechanisms of DNA metabolism, nucleotide metabolism, and cofactor metabolism in Mycobacterium tuberculosis, particularly as they apply to TB drug discovery. As a Unit that receives funding through two major grants from the South African government, research capacity development forms a key focus of the MMRU’s work.
The MMRU comprises senior scientists, early-career researchers, post-doctoral fellows, and PhD and MSc students, and also participates in several major TB drug discovery consortia funded by grants from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation under the TB Drug Accelerator program (SHORTEN-TB) and the SHIP programme of the SAMRC.
Selected publications:
Warner, D.F., Ndwandwe, D.E., Abrahams, G.L., Kana, B.D., Venclovas, Č., and Mizrahi, V. 2010. Essential roles for imuA’ and imuB-encoded accessory factors in DnaE2-dependent mutagenesis in mycobacteria. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 107:13093-13098.
Abrahams, G.L., Kumar, A., Savvi, S., Hung, A.W., Wen, S., Abell, C.A., Barry, C.E. III, Sherman, D.R., Boshoff, H.I.M, and Mizrahi, V. 2012. Pathway-selective sensitization of Mycobacterium tuberculosis for target-based whole-cell screening. Chemistry & Biology 19:844-854.
Warner D.F., Evans, J.C., and Mizrahi, V. 2014. Nucleotide metabolism and DNA replication. In: Molecular Genetics of the Mycobacteria, 2nd Edition (Hatfull, G.F. & Jacobs, W.R., Jr., eds). ASM Press, Washington, ch. 30, pg. 635-656. doi: 10.1128/microbiolspec.MGM2-001-2013
Warner, D.F. and Mizrahi, V. 2014. Translation of genomics research into control of tuberculosis: lessons learned and future prospects. Genome Biol. 15:514. doi:10.1186/s13059-014-0514-z
Warner, D.F., Koch, A., and Mizrahi, V. 2015. Diversity and disease pathogenesis in Mycobacterium tuberculosis. Trends Microbiol. 23:14-21. doi: 10.1016/j.tim.2014.10.005.
Singh, V., Brecik, M., Mukherjee, R., Evans, J.C., Svetlíková, S., Blaško, J., Blackburn, J., Warner, D.F., Mikušová, K. and Mizrahi, V. 2015. The complex mechanism of antimycobacterial action of 5-fluorouracil. Chem. Biol. 22:1-13.
Evans JC, Trujillo C, Wang Z, Eoh H, Ehrt S, Schnappinger D, Boshoff HIM, Rhee KY, Barry CE, Mizrahi V. 2016. Validation of CoaBC as a bactericidal target in the coenzyme a pathway of Mycobacterium tuberculosis. ACS Infectious Diseases 2(12):958-968.
Singh V, Mizrahi V. Identification and validation of novel drug targets in Mycobacterium tuberculosis. 2016. Drug Discovery Today 22(3):503-509.
Singh, V., Donini, S., Pacitto, A., Sala, C., Hartkoorn, R.C., Dhar, N., Keri, G., Ascher, D.B., Mondésert, G., Vocat, A., Lupien, A., Sommer, R., Vermet, H., Lagrange, S., Buechler, J., Warner, D.F., McKinney, J.D., Pato, J., Cole, S.T., Blundell, T.L., Rizzi, M., and Mizrahi, V. The inosine monophosphate dehydrogenase, GuaB2, is a vulnerable new bactericidal drug target for tuberculosis. ACS Infect. Dis. 2017; 3:5-17. DOI: 10.1021/acsinfecdis.6b00102. PMCID# PMC5241705
Singh, V., Dhar, N., Pato, J., Kolly, G.S., Korduláková, J., Forbák, M., Evans, J.C., Szekely, R.E., Rybnicker, J.L., Svetlíková, Z., Zemanová, J., Santi, I., Signorino-Gelo, F., Rodrigues L., Vocat, A., Covarrubias, A.S., Rengifo, M.G., Johnsson, K., Mowbray, S., Buechler, J., Delorme, V., Brodin, P., Knott, G.W., Ainsa, J., Warner, D.F., Keri, G., Mikušová, K., McKinney, J.D., Cole, S.T.*, Mizrahi, V.* and Hartkoorn, R.C.* Identification of Aminopyrimidine-Sulfonamides as potent modulators of Wag31-mediated cell elongation in mycobacteria. Mol. Microbiol. 2017; 103:13-25. DOI: 10.1111/mmi.13535 [*Joint senior authors]
Evans, J., and Mizrahi, V. Priming the tuberculosis drug pipeline: new antimycobacterial targets and agents. Curr. Opin. Microbiol. 2018; 45:39-46
Koch, A., Cox, H., and Mizrahi, V. 2018. Drug resistant TB: Mechanisms of resistance and implications for diagnosis and disease management. Curr. Opin. Pharmacol. 42:7-15. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.coph.2018.05.013
Contact details:
Room 3.01, Wolfson Pavilion
Anzio Road
UCT Faculty of Health Sciences
Observatory 7925
Cape Town, South Africa
Tel: +27 21 4066098
Fax: +27 21 4066068
Email: valerie.mizrahi@uct.ac.za
Alternative sites: www.medmicro.uct.ac.za
www.mrc.ac.za/mycobacteriology/mycobacteriology.htm
Group members:
| Member | Position |
|---|---|
| Digby Warner | Deputy Director, MMRU |
| Joanna Evans | Research Officer |
| Melissa Chengalroyen | Research Officer |
| Anastasia Koch | Junior Research Fellow |
| Gabriel Mashabela | Postdoctoral fellow |
| Saber Anoosheh | Postdoctoral fellow |
| Sophia Gessner | Postdoctoral fellow |
| Charles Omollo | Postdoctoral fellow |
| Pooja Agarwal | Postdoctoral fellow |
| Mandy Mason | Postdoctoral fellow |
| Ryan Dinkele | PhD (Medical Microbiology) |
| Irene Gobe | PhD (Medical Microbiology) |
| Terry Kipkorir | PhD (Medical Microbiology) |
| Zela Martin | PhD (Medical Microbiology) |
| Rendani Mbau | PhD (Medical Microbiology) |
| Michael Reiche | PhD (Medical Microbiology) |
| Bianca Masuku | PhD (Medical Microbiology) |
| Timothy de Wet | PhD (Medical Microbiology) |
| Caitlin Taylor | MSc (Medical Microbiology) |
| Lucas Raphela | MSc (Medical Microbiology) |
| Audrey Jordaan | Lab Technologist |
| Sasha-Lee Lynch | Lab Technologist |
| Lameeza Jakoet | Administrative Assistant |
Collaborations:
Dr. Clifton E. Barry III, NIAID, NIH, USA
Dr. Helena I. Boshoff, NIAID, NIH, USA
Prof. Paul Wyatt & Dr. Simon Green, Drug Discovery Unit, University of Dundee
Prof. Rolf Müller, Helmholtz Institute for Pharmaceutical Research, Saarland
Dr. David Olsen & Katherine Young, Merck Research Laboratories, USA
Prof. Deborah Hung, Broad Institute of MIT & Harvard
Prof. Menico Rizzi, Università degli Studi del Piemonte Orientale, Italy
Dr. Janos Pato, Vichem, Hungary
Prof. Tom Blundell, Cambridge University, UK
Dr. David Ascher, Cambridge University
Prof. Lizbeth Hedstrom, Brandeis University
Prof Erick Strauss, Stellenbosch University
Dr Vinayak Singh, UCT
Emer. Prof. Siamon Gordon, University of Oxford
Dr. Fernando Martinez Estrada, University of Surrey
