Marnett Research Laboratory

Ansari Aleem is a Research Assistant Professor in the Marnett lab at Vanderbilt University. Ansari Aleem received his Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees in Biochemistry from Aligarh Muslim University. He then moved back to his home town, Mumbai, and obtained his Ph.D. degree in 2004 in Life Sciences from Mumbai University under the guidance of Dr. M.K. Sharma. He did his postdoctoral training with Prof. Jankun at the University of Toledo where he worked on structural-functional studies of 12-Lipoxygenase.  He then moved to Saudi Arabia and taught biochemistry to medical undergraduates and post graduates in the Master’s program in Biochemistry at the Medical College at King Faisal University where he was the course coordinator for Molecular Biology techniques and Enzymology courses.

In November 2015, Ansari joined the laboratory of Prof. Ted Holman at the University of California Santa Cruz and continued to work on understanding the active site of 12-Lipoxygenase. He was also involved in discovering small molecules that inhibit this enzyme, which is involved in many human diseases. After 2.5  years at UCSC, he joined the laboratory of Dr. Lawrence Marnett to work on another member of the oxygenase family, i.e. Cyclooxygenases.  He is currently involved in understanding the structure, function, and inhibition of COX-2. Another project that he is working on is the oxygenation of endocannabinoids by COX-2.