Research in the group of Piet Gros
The research group of Piet Gros uses X-ray crystallography and cryo-EM to study bio-molecular recognition and regulation processes with emphasis on bio-medically important proteins, in particular in the area of infection and immunity.
Regulation in cells and organisms is achieved by the interplay of proteins acting in concert to achieve a control over time and space. In many cases, the proteins involved are multi-domain proteins that function in large complexes. This enables a collective set of proteins to form a protein machinery that carries out elementary regulatory functions such as initiation, amplification, localization and inhibition. Our goal is to reveal the mechanisms of tertiary and quaternary-induced activation in multi-domain proteins and multi-protein complexes that underlie these recognition and regulation processes.
The group has three main focus areas: