Saarbrücken, 09 July 2020 - Dr. phil Alexander Titz, currently research group leader at the HIPS and junior professor at Saarland University, received the certificate of appointment as Professor for Organic and Pharmaceutical Chemistry at the Saarland State Chancellery on Wednesday (8 July 2020).
Alexander Titz studied chemistry at the Technical University of Darmstadt and the University of Bordeaux. In April 2008, he received his doctorate from the University of Basel on the subject of the medicinal chemistry of carbohydrate-protein interactions. He has been the head of the research group ‘Chemical Biology of Carbohydrates’ at the HIPS since 2013 and a junior professor at Saarland University since 2018.
Alexander Titz’s research focuses on the synthetic development of novel drug candidates and diagnostics for bacterial infections. Starting from the natural carbohydrate receptors of the bacterial proteins, glycomimetics are produced using organic-chemical methods, which can prevent the bacteria from attaching to the host and block the biofilms that are involved in chronic infections.
Other focal points of his work are the biochemical characterisation of previously unknown bacterial lectins, i.e. carbohydrate-binding proteins, and microbiological investigation of their role in the mechanisms of infection.
At Saarland University, Alexander Titz will train chemistry students in organic and pharmaceutical chemistry, as well as teaching carbohydrate chemistry and glycobiology.
Within the university’s NanoBioMed focus , the professorship at Saarland University will further connect the Departments of Chemistry and Pharmacy and the Faculty of Medicine and it will expand the link between the university and the non-university research institute HIPS. It is jointly supported by Saarland University and the HIPS, a branch of the Helmholtz Centre for Infection Research, and funded by the German Center for Infection Research (DZIF).
Alexander Titz will assume his duties as a professor at Saarland University on 8 July 2020.
Saarland University appoints Alexander Titz as Professor for Organic and Pharmaceutical Chemistry
HIPS research group leader develops drug candidates and diagnostics for bacterial infections
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