I am currently concluding my postdoctoral studies in the Honig Lab. Recently, in collaboration with Richard Mann, we introduced a new database called OnTheFly for Drosophila melanogaster transcription factors and their binding sites. Briefly, this database integrates, in one location, structural and sequential information for both protein and DNA. Such a combined database is unique and can substantially contribute to our understanding of protein-DNA recognition processes, thereby leading to novel mechanistic conclusions and suggesting new candidates for experimental procedures and drug designs.

I am trained in both computer science (BSc) and biological sciences (MSc and PhD). My PhD thesis, under the supervision of Yael Mandel-Gutfreund at the Technion Israel, focused on computational approaches for the study of protein-RNA interactions. I developed a method for extracting and displaying positive electrostatic patches on the protein surface. This method, termed PFplus, is applicable for identifying functional interfaces on proteins, especially nucleic acid binding interfaces. By applying PFplus and using a machine-learning approach we predicted nucleic acid-binding functions based on the electrostatic properties of proteins. This prediction method was published in PLoS Computational Biology and was later validated experimentally in collaboration with Haim Manor at the Technion.