Eliane received her BSc in molecular biochemistry summa cum laude from the Technion – Israel Institute of Technology. She pursued her MSc in the Department of Molecular Genetics at the Weizmann Institute of Science, studying the interaction between bacterial species living on plant roots. Eliane then joined Prof. Eitan Bibi’s lab in the Department of Biomolecular Sciences at the Weizmann Institute, where she worked on the E. coli multidrug transporter MdfA, a protein that transports toxic compounds out of the cell.

 

Eliane’s work on MdfA centered around understanding the transport mechanism of MdfA, including elucidating the conformational changes that occur during the binding and releasing of cytotoxic molecules. To this end, she used a variety of biochemical and biophysical techniques, in collaboration with Prof. Daniella Goldfarb in the Department of Chemical and Biological Physics at the Weizmann Institute and Prof. Hassane Mchaourab at Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tennessee. Her research suggested that the functional conformational cycle of MdfA differs from the canonical cycle of transporters in the same family.

 

Eliane will be starting her postdoctoral fellowship in the lab of Dr. Moran Shalev-Benami at the Weizmann Institute, studying the signaling mechanism of adhesion G-protein-coupled receptors (aGPCRs), which are membrane proteins that transfer information between cells and their environment in the nervous system.