Annette Shrive

Biography

I undertook both my BSc (Physics and Maths) and PhD (Protein Crystallography) at Keele University. The latter involved the development of synchrotron x-ray Laue method for use with large macromolecules such as proteins and viruses. During my early career I have been a visiting scientist at Purdue University, USA and LMB Cambridge and have undertaken postdoctoral work in structural biology at Purdue University, University of Edinburgh and Keele University. I was appointed as a Lecturer at Keele University in September 1999 and have been a member of School of Life Sciences academic staff since then. Alongside an established research group working on innate immunity and structural biology, I am an active member of the Biochemistry and Biomedical Science course teaching teams as well as overseeing academic mentoring and student engagement with the School.

Research and scholarship

My research in the Structural Biology group is on molecular structure, recognition and effector mechanisms in the innate immune system and in particular the three-dimensional structures of pentraxins and active fragments of collectins and related proteins complexed with physiologically relevant ligands. Within our research we use a variety of biochemical and biophysical techniques to determine the three-dimensional structure of these molecules as well as how these molecules are functioning in the immune system.

Examples of this work can be seen here:

Human surfactant protein D fragment with inner core oligosaccharide in alternative binding modes for the same bacterial lipopolysaccharide Littlejohn et al., PLoS ONE, (2018)  doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0199175	FIBCD1 with bound carbohydrate ligand Williams et al., Journal of Biological Chemistry, (2024) doi.org/10.1016/j.jbc.2023.105552	Structure of innate immune protein human C-reactive protein - Image - T J Greenhough & A K Shrive © Keele University Shrive et al., Nature Structural & Molecular Biology, (1996) doi:10.1038/nsb0496-346

Teaching

My main area of teaching is within the Biochemistry and Biomedical Science courses and on School of Life Sciences MRes programmes. My focus is on structural biology, immunology and related biochemical techniques. Modules that I am involved in teaching are given below.

Year 2

• LSC-20015 Molecular, Cellular & Structural Immunology (Module Leader)

Year 3

• LSC-30110 Structural Immunology
• LSC-30102 Research Project
• LSC-30050 Life Sciences Dissertation

Masters level

• LSC-40061 Advanced Research Topics in Biochemistry
• LSC-40111 Advanced Research Topics in Structural Biology (Module Leader)
• LSC-40065 Literature Review and Grant Proposal
• LSC-40063 MSci Research Project
• LSC-40105 MRes Bioscience Extended Research Project
• LSC-40131 Research Project