Dr Sofia Oliveira is among three successful candidates selected from across the UK and the US to receive £90,000 funding as a 2022 Oracle for Research Fellow and £120,000 Oracle universal Cloud credits, which give researchers the flexibility to use any Oracle Cloud Infrastructure and platform services.
Dr Oliveira’s project aims to transform and accelerate the study of changes in proteins by using an innovative computational method, which allows the response of proteins to a structural perturbation to be mapped in a new way for the first time.
This approach will shed further light on two important biomedical targets. Firstly, the cystic fibrosis transmembrane conductance regulator channel, which is a protein responsible for chloride and bicarbonate equilibrium in cells and its malfunction causes the inherited condition. Secondly, nicotinic acetylcholine receptors which are channels expressed in the nervous system involved in many functions, including cognition and addiction.