一份来自英国的消息指出，著名的利华休姆信托 (Leverhulme Trust)，将颁发一项杰出研究奖 (Research Leadership Award)，给从事病毒几何学 (viruses geometry)研究的学者 Reidun Twarock博士。
据了解获奖的 Twarock博士，属于约克大学(University of York) 生物数学学系(Departments of Biology and Mathematics) 的科学家，Twarock 博士还是该大学的年度学者，长久以来领导的研究团队，透过了解病毒结构的方式，发展具有潜力的抗病毒方法。
Twarock 博士表示，病毒粒子是一个具有高度对称性的立体结构，病毒透过其所携带的DNA 分子，架构外壳的蛋白分子，那么如果可以透过结构的信息，利用数学的方法辅助，很有可能从病毒的外壳，就可以找到破解病毒的方法，那么对于现阶段抗病毒的药物研究，应该会有很大的帮助。
目前 Twarock博士打算用该杰出研究奖所获赠的七十万美金，成立一个新的研究计划，以加速病毒几何学等相关领域的研究发展。
(资料来源 : Bio.com)
英文原文：
bio.com/newsfeatures
York Mathematician Probes Geometric Route to Combat Viruses
04/02/07 -- A mathematician at the University of York has been awarded a Research Leadership Award of more than $700,000 by the Leverhulme Trust to study the geometry of viruses.
Dr Reidun Twarock, an Anniversary Reader in the Departments of Biology and Mathematics, will study the structure and assembly of viruses, which will help to develop new anti-viral strategies.
Viruses have highly symmetrical external shells formed from proteins that encapsulate the viral genome. Dr Twarock has developed a method for encoding the structures of these protein shells that pinpoint the locations of the proteins and the bonds between them. With collaborators Professor Cristian Micheletti, from the International School for Advanced Studies (SISSA) in Trieste, Italy, and Professor Anne Taormina, from the University of Durham, she has used these results to model the assembly of viruses.
Subsequent work with collaborators Professor Peter Stockley, Dr Neil Ranson and their groups at the Astbury Centre for Structural Molecular Biology at the University of Leeds suggests that not only the geometry of the viral capsids themselves but also the full three-dimensional structures of the particles are constrained. The implications of this discovery on virus assembly are currently being investigated.
Dr Twarock said: "I would like to use the Leverhulme Trust Award to build up a group of mathematicians, computational biologists and biophysicists to address a portfolio of projects arising from these results."
This grant will enable Dr Twarock to expand her group and fund three postdoctoral positions and four PhD students. The group will collaborate closely with the Astbury Centre in Leeds, and they will jointly organise a workshop on Mathematical Virology at the International Centre for Mathematical Sciences in August 2007.
Dr Twarock's group will be part of the York Centre of Complex Systems Analysis (YCCSA), including biologists, mathematicians and computer scientists, which is based in the Department of Biology at York.
Source: University of York
