Scientist Bios
Alfredo F. Galvez, Ph.D
Center Scientist, Center of Excellence for Nutritional Genomics,
University of California, Davis, CA
Adjunct Assistant Professor,
University of Missouri, Columbia, MO
Lead Scientific Advisor,
Soy Labs, LLC, Mexico, MO
Dr. Alfredo Galvez joined the Center of Excellence in Nutritional Genomics six years ago to work on elucidating the molecular mechanism of action of the soy peptide, lunasin. Dr. Galvez serendipitously discovered the anti-cancer properties of the lunasin peptide, while working as a postdoctoral researcher on a project to increase the methionine content of soy protein at UC Berkeley in the late 1990's. His work led to the novel finding that lunasin binds specifically to deacetylated histones H3 and H4 and prevents their acetylation via a masking effect. Inhibitors of histone acetylation are correlated with gene repression, however microarray analysis of prostate cells treated with lunasin under basal condition showed that this soy peptide upregulates expression of chemopreventive genes but only in the non-tumorigenic cell line. The current working model to explain the microarray results is that lunasin preferentially binds to deacetylated lysine 8 in histone H4 and increases acetylation of H4-lysine 16, leading to increased gene expression.
Dr. Galvez continues to work with the University of Missouri to further demonstrate Lunasin’s effect on LDL cholesterol. This is based on his discovery that lunasin can inhibit the acetylation of histone H3 by the PCAF histone acetylase enzyme and reduce expression of HMG-CoA reductase (the rate-limiting enzyme for cholesterol biosynthesis) in liver cells. Chromatin immunoprecipitation (ChIP) have shown that SREBP transcriptional activation of HMG-CoA reductase requires H3 acetylation by PCAF. This discovery provides a mechanism of action to explain the cholesterol-lowering effects of soy protein and paves the way for optimizing soy protein ingredients to maximize its heart-healthy benefits.
Prior to joining the Center, Dr. Galvez has founded and worked in a start-up biotech company. He obtained his Ph.D. in Genetics from UC Davis in 1992 and has worked as a research scientist for the USDA and UC Berkeley.
Notable Lunasin research includes:
Lunasin Peptide Upregulates Thrombospondin 1 (THBS1) Gene Expression in Non-Tumorigenic Prostate Epithelial Cells
Differential Expression of Thrombospondin (THBS1) in Tumorigenic and Nontumorigenic Prostate Epithelial Cells in Response to a Chromatin-Binding Soy Peptide
Lunasin Suppresses E1A-Mediated Transformation of Mammalian Cells But Does Not Inhibit Growth of Immortalized and Established Cancer Cell Lines
Chemopreventive Property of a Soybean Peptide (Lunasin) That Binds to Deacetylated Histones and Inhibits Acetylation
A soybean cDNA encoding a chromatin binding peptide inhibits mitosis of mammalian cells
Epigenetic Regulation of HMG-CoA Reductase and LDL Receptor Expression By The Soy Peptide Lunasin Provides Mechanism for Lowering Cholesterol
Ben O. de Lumen, Ph.D.
Professor, Dept. of Nutritional Sciences and Toxicology
University of California, Berkeley, CA
Prof. Ben de Lumen has been a faculty member at the University of California for 30 years. He obtained his undergraduate degree in Agricultural Chemistry from University of the Philippines
and a Ph.D. in Agricultural Chemistry/Biochemistry from University of California at Davis. After spending
almost 5 years in industry in the U.S., he joined the faculty at UC Berkeley. His current research interest focuses on lunasin, a unique and novel cancer preventive seed peptide that has been shown to be efficacious against chemical carcinogens and oncogenes in cell culture models and a skin cancer mouse model. His lab continues research on lunasin to demonstrate its efficacy against various cancers through dietary administration of lunasin and elucidate its molecular mechanisms of action.
Notable Lunasin research includes:
Lunasin-Aspirin Combination Against NIH/3T3 Cells Transformation Induced by Chemical Carcinogens
Lunasin, a novel seed peptide for cancer prevention
Lunasin: A Novel Cancer Preventive Seed Peptide that Modifies Chromatin
Lunasin: A Cancer-Preventive Soy Peptide
Lunasin Suppresses E1A-Mediated Transformation of Mammalian Cells But Does Not Inhibit Growth of Immortalized and Established Cancer Cell Lines
Raymond Rodriguez
Director and Professor Center of Excellence for Nutritional Genomics Department of Molecular & Cellular Biology
University of California, Davis, CA
Dr. Rodriguez is a Professor in the Department of Molecular & Cellular Biology and is currently Director of the NIH-sponsored Center of Excellence for Nutritional Genomics at the University of California, Davis. After receiving his Ph.D. at the University of California, Santa Cruz in 1974, he was an A.P. Giannini Foundation Postdoctoral Fellow in the laboratory of Herbert W. Boyer at UC San Francisco Medical Center. While at UCSF, Dr. Rodriguez developed molecular cloning technologies that now serve as the foundation for the biotechnology industry. His 1977 paper on the construction of the cloning vector, pBR322, has been cited more than 5000 times. Dr. Rodriguez joined the faculty at the UC Davis in 1977 and is actively involved in research and teaching at the undergraduate and graduate level. In 1988, Dr. Rodriguez was a Distinguished Visiting Professor in the International Center for Biotechnology at Osaka University, Japan, and in 1991, he was a Visiting Scientist with the Human Genome Project at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. From 1989 to 1992, Dr. Rodriguez established the International Rice Genome Organization — a US/Japan bilateral group that helped establish the framework for sequencing the rice genome. In 2003 he became Director of the Center of Excellence for Nutritional Genomics, a multi-investigator, multi-institutional research program to study the impact of diet-genome interactions on human health. For his leadership in the field of nutritional genomics, Dr. Rodriguez was selected as the 2008 distinguished lecturer by the USDA-ARS Beltsville Center and in 2009 he received an Honorary Doctorate of Science from the Nara Institute of Science and Technology, Nara Japan. Dr. Rodriguez is a member of numerous scientific organizations and committees and he has been an adviser to the NIH and NSF since 1988. He has published numerous articles and books on molecular biology and biotechnology. Dr. Rodriguez currently holds 18 U.S. patents and his latest book, Dietary Regulation of Gene Function and Its Impact on Health (W. Bidlack and R.L. Rodriguez, eds. Taylor & Francis CRC) will appear in 2011. His current research focus is nutritional epigenomics, the study of how dietary factors alter human gene activity by chromatin modification. In addition to his academic duties, Dr. Rodriguez is chairman, CEO of Davis Bioscience Group, a life science technical and management consulting company serving the needs of large multinational corporations as well as the individual bioentrepreneur.
Notable Lunasin research includes:
Lunasin Peptide Upregulates Thrombospondin 1 (THBS1) Gene Expression in Non-Tumorigenic Prostate Epithelial Cells
Differential Expression of Thrombospondin (THBS1) in Tumorigenic and Nontumorigenic Prostate Epithelial Cells in Response to a Chromatin-Binding Soy Peptide
Blanca Hernandez-Ledesma
Postdoctoral Marie-Curie Fellow
Blanca Hernandez-Ledesma is currently a Postdoctoral Marie-Curie Fellow of European Commission in the Department of Nutritional Sciences and Toxicology at University of California, Berkeley. Her Bachelor’s Degree in Pharmacy was earned with Honors at the Complutense University of Madrid, Spain in 1998. Some months later, she started to work in the Spanish National Research Council (CSIC, Madrid, Spain) focusing on the study of biological properties, such as antihypertensive, antioxidant, and antimicrobial activities, of peptides and proteins derived from milk and dairy products. She earned her Ph.D. in Pharmacy in 2002, and she continued working as postdoctoral fellow at the CSIC group until 2007 when she moved to San Francisco Bay Area for a postdoctoral work at the University of California, Berkeley.
She joined Prof. de Lumen’s group where she is studying the cancer preventive properties of lunasin, a peptide first discovered by this group in soy and afterwards in barley and wheat. She is currently conducting animal experiments to demonstrate the in vivo properties of lunasin. She is also focused on studying the molecular epigenetic mechanism of action of this peptide.
Notable Lunasin research includes:
Lunasin-Aspirin Combination Against NIH/3T3 Cells Transformation Induced by Chemical Carcinogens
Relationship between lunasin’s sequence and its inhibitory activity of histones H3 and H4 acetylation
Complementary Roles in Cancer Prevention: Protease Inhibitor Makes the Cancer Preventive Peptide Lunasin Bioavailable
Lunasin, a novel seed peptide, sensitizes human breast cancer MDA-MB-231 cells to aspirin-arrested cell cycle and induced apoptosis
Lunasin and Bowman-Birk protease inhibitor (BBI) in US commercial soy foods
Elvira Gonzalez de Mejia
Associate Professor of Food Chemistry and Food Toxicology
University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, IL
Dr. Elvira de Mejia has a B.S. degree in Biochemical Engineering from the National Polytechnic Institute (Mexico), M.S. degree in Food Science and Technology from the University of California, Davis and Ph.D. in Plant Biotechnology from the National Polytechnic Institute (Mexico). Dr. de Mejia joined the UIUC faculty in 2002. Dr. de Mejia has published over 110 peer-reviewed publications, over 100 scientific presentations on the areas of Food Science, Food Toxicology, and Chemoprevention at different national and international scientific meetings.
Dr. de Mejia conducts research in the areas of Food Chemistry, Food Biochemistry and Food Toxicology. Her research is focused on: food components with health benefits; analysis, characterization and mechanism of action of antimutagenic and anticarcinogenic compounds in foods (legumes, oilseeds, and vegetables). Dr de Mejia is currently working with bioactive proteins in different legume genotypes. She is investigating the role of genetic diversity and environmental conditions on the presence, concentration and physicochemical characteristics of the bioactive soybean seed proteins with biological potential against transformed human cells.
Notable Lunasin research includes:
Lunasin Potentiates the Effect of Oxaliplatin Preventing Outgrowth of Colon Cancer Metastasis, Binds to α5β1 Integrin and Suppresses FAK/ERK/NF-κB Signaling
Lunasin induces apoptosis and modifies the expression of genes associated with extracellular matrix and cell adhesion in human metastatic colon cancer cells
Lunasin promotes apoptosis in human colon cancer cells by mitochondrial pathway activation and induction of nuclear clusterin expression
The role of nutraceutical proteins and peptides in apoptosis, angiogenesis, and metastasis of cancer cells
Lunasin and lunasin-like peptides inhibit inflammation through suppression of NF-kB pathway in the macrophage
Monty Kerley
Professor, Nutrition, Division of Animal Sciences
University of Missouri, Columbia, MO
Dr. Kerley has been a faculty member at the University of Missouri since 1987. He obtained his undergraduate degree in Animal Industries from Southern Illinois University and a Ph.D. in Ruminant Nutrition from the University of Illinois. Dr. Kerley began his career at the University of Missouri as Graduate Nutrition Faculty. Dr. Kerley has had four patents awarded in animal feed applications.
Dr. Kerley states his academic focus as: “Four principles define my academic focus. These principles are to uphold the vision of the land-grant mission, to enhance the stature of the University of Missouri, to provide an educational environment that fosters intellectual development of graduate students, and to make scientific contributions of sufficient magnitude within my area of intellectual curiosity to enhance production agriculture. I believe the future of academic research will be dependent upon forming collaborative agreements and partnerships with private concerns for the purpose of developing marketable intellectual property. I am a partner in three faculty start-up companies, consult for commodity organizations and industry, and serve as a scientific advisory board chair.”
Notable Lunasin research includes:
Epigenetic Regulation of HMG-CoA Reductase and LDL Receptor Expression By The Soy Peptide Lunasin Provides Mechanism for Lowering Cholesterol