RNA Structure and Function

Jan Barciszewski is Professor at Adam Mickiewicz University (AMU) in Poznań, Poland, and at the Institute of Bioorganic Chemistry of the Polish Academy of Sciences, Poznań, Poland, where he has worked since 1974. He studied organic chemistry at the AMU. During his Ph.D. studies, he worked on the structure and function of modified bases and nucleoside sequences of plant phenylalanine-specific transfer ribonucleic acid (tRNA), including cytokinins. He was subsequently granted Doctor of Science degree for his work on the properties of plant tRNAs and aminoacyl-tRNA synthetases. In the 1990s, he began working on the diagnosis and therapy of brain tumors. He developed a new method for the transformation of plant mitochondria based on catalytic RNAs and is currently involved in studies on a new type of catalytic RNAs (enantiomeric ribozymes) for efficient RNA target cleavage in vivo, as well as the search for new anti-aging agents.