Elizabeth Kellogg | AIChE

Elizabeth Kellogg

Assistant Professor
Cornell University

Since the Kellogg lab opened in 2019 at Cornell University, they have contributed significantly to mechanistic understanding of DNA transposons using cryo-EM. Their major goal is to understand how transposons reshape genomes and how transposons can be repurposed as genome-editing tools. The Kellogg lab's first significant scientific contribution includes the structural and mechanistic characterization of a unique cut and paste transposase, called the P-element transposase, published in NSMB (2019). The Kellogg lab also formulated the first model of transposition that could explain the behavior of programmable, CRISPR-associated transposons, which was recently published in Science (2021). Using a combination of biochemistry, cryo-EM, and genetic assays, they described a highly regulated and complex biochemical process that would result in programmable DNA insertions while simultaneously avoiding previous insertion sites. The Kellogg lab is well funded (by a R01 from NIH NIGMS) to continue exploring the implications of the proposed mechanistic model. In addition, the Kellogg lab is exploring avenues to re-engineer CAST (and related) elements using protein design.