Dr. James Hall
Associate Professor in Biomolecular Structure and Education
University of Reading
Professional background: James Hall is an Associate Professor at the University of Reading. His research interests focus on the structure and function of nucleic acids. He is an experienced X-ray crystallographer and user of the Diamond Light Source (UK), with over 45 structures published in the Protein Data Bank. He is experienced in the use of solution-phase techniques, including UV/visible absorbance and circular dichroism, to cross-validate crystal structures with solution behaviour. He is particularly interested in the mechanisms of nucleic acid damage, the development and exploitation of non-canonical nucleic acid structures for therapeutic applications and DNA-ligand interactions. Along with his scientific research, he engages in pedagogic and educational research, with a particular interest in using virtual reality methods within teaching. He has collaborated to develop, deploy and evaluate VR-based teaching materials on a class scale within both chemistry-focused and clinical teaching.
Selected publications:
- M. Dalla Pozza, P. Mesdom, A. Abdullrahman, T. D. Prieto Otoya, P. Arnoux, C. Frochot, G. Niogret, B. Saubaméa, P. Burckel, J. P. Hall, M. Hollestein, C. J. Cardin, G. Gasser. Increasing the π-Expansive Ligands in Ruthenium(II) Polypyridyl Complexes: Synthesis, Characterization, and Biological Evaluation for Photodynamic Therapy Applications, Inorganic Chemistry, 62, 45, 18510-18523 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1021/acs.inorgchem.3c02606
- M. Dalla Pozza, A. Abdullrahman, C. Cardin, G. Gasser, J. P. Hall. Three’s a crowd – stabilisation, structure, and applications of DNA triplexes, Chemical Science, 13, 10193-10215 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1039/D2SC01793H
- Y. Baker, C. Thorpe, J. Chen, L. Poller, L. Cox, P. Kumar, W. Lim, L. Lie, G. McClorey, S. Eppel, D. Singleton, M. McDonough, J. Hardwick, K. Christensen, M. Wood, J. Hall, A. El-Sagheer, T. Brown. An LNA-amide modification that enhances the cell uptake and activity of phosphorothioate exon-skipping oligonucleotides, Nature Communications, 13, 4036 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-022-31636-2
- K. T. McQuaid, S. Takahashi, L. Beumgaertner, D. J. Cardin, N. G. Paterson, J. P. Hall, N. Sugimoto, C. Cardin. Ruthenium Polypyridyl Complex Bound to a Unimolecular Chair-Form G-Quadruplex, Journal of American Chemical Society, 144, 13, 5956-5964 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1021/jacs.2c00178