August 14, 2008
Mike Jarstfer, PhD, an associate professor at the UNC Eshelman School of Pharmacy, has received two grants.
One of the grants, “The Structure of Telomerase RNA Attending Catalysis”, is from the National Science Foundation. It is worth $556,000 for three years and will support Jarstfer’s study of telomerase structure.
The other grant, on which Jarstfer is the coprincipal investigator, is from the North Carolina Biotechnology Center. The project is titled “Development of Non-Peptide Human Oxytocin Receptor Agonist and Potentiator Drugs” and aims to discover new therapeutics for treating diseases characterized by social deficits, such as autism. The grant provides $215,863 over two years.
Jarstfer has been a member of the faculty in the School’s Division of Medicinal Chemistry and Natural Products since 2001. His lab is interested in problems regarding enzyme function, drug-discovery, and biotechnology.