Dr Christopher Draper-Joyce
PhD
Location
Parkville Campus
30 Royal Parade
Parkville Victoria 3052
Research group
Drug Discovery Innovation Group
Biography
Chris completed his PhD in 2017 at Monash University. He focused on allosteric targeting of the dopamine D2 receptor (D2R) under the supervision of Dr Robert Lane. Chris undertook postdoctoral training within the group of Professor Arthur Christopoulos, working on the structural understanding of signalling, biased agonism, and allosterism of G-protein-coupled receptors (GPCRs), in particular the adenosine A1 receptor. During this time, he successfully solved the first cryo-electron microscopy (cryo-EM) structure of the active adenosine A1 receptor bound to the endogenous ligand adenosine and coupled to the inhibitory Gi protein.
In 2020, Chris received an Australian Research Council Discovery Early Career Researcher Award and joined the group of Associate Professor Daniel Scott and Professor Ross Bathgate within the Drug Discovery Innovation Group at The Florey.
Career highlights
Current roles
- Co-Head of the Drug Discovery Innovation Lab
Other highlights
- Co-Founder of LASEREDD Therapeutics (www.lasereddtx.com)
Awards and achievements
- 2022 – National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC) Investigator Grant Emerging Leadership Level 1 (EL1)
- 2021 – Royal Society of Victoria Phillip Law Postdoctoral Award
- 2021 – Jack Brockhoff Foundation & Marian and EH Flack Trust Early Career Research Grant
- 2021 – Perpetual’s 2021 IMPACT Philanthropy funding
- 2021-2023 – NHMRC Ideas Grant (CIC; APP2001027) – Relaxin receptor structural determination to aid therapeutic development
- 2020 – Asia-Pacific Protein Association Young Scientist Award
- 2020-2022 – Australian Research Council Discovery Early Career Researcher Award (ARC DECRA) – Structural insights into activation, dynamics and bias of GPCRs
- 2020 – University of Melbourne Establishment Grant