Anuradha Weerakkody

Research

  • pHLIP interaction with lipid bilayer of liposomes and cell membrane
  • Protein fluorescence and structure
  • pHLIP and pHLIC technology

Education

  • Postdoctoral Research Fellow, Department of Physics, University of Rhode Island, 2013-2014
  • Ph.D. in Physics (Biological Physics), University of Rhode Island, 2013
  • M.S. in Physics, University of Rhode Island, 2009
  • B.Sc. in Physics, Chemistry :Faculty of Science, University of Peradeniya, Sri Lanka, 2003

Selected Publications

Slaybaugh G, Weerakkody D, Engelman DM, Andreev OA, Reshetnyak YK. Kinetics of pHLIP peptide insertion into and exit from a membrane. Proc Natl Acad Sci USA.
2020 pii: 201917857

Karabadzhak, Alexander G., et al. “Bilayer thickness and curvature influence binding and insertion of a pHLIP peptide.” Biophysical journal 114.9 (2018): 2107-2115.

Narayanan T, Weerakkody D, Karabadzhak AG, et al. pHLIP® Peptide Interaction With Membrane Monitored by SAXS. J Phys Chem B (2016) doi:10.1021/acs.jpcb.6b06643.

Weerakkody D, Andreev OA, and Reshetnyak, YK. Insertion into Lipid Bilayer of Truncated pHLIP® Peptide. Biochemistry and Biophysics Reports (2016) doi:10.1016/j.bbrep.2016.10.001.

Weerakkody, D. et al. Novel pH-Sensitive Cyclic Peptides. Sci. Rep. 6, 31322; doi:10.1038/srep31322 (2016).

Dhammika Weerakkody, Anna Moshnikova, Mak S. Thakur, Valentina Moshnikova, Jennifer Daniels, Donald M. Engelman, Oleg A. Andreev, and Yana K. Reshetnyak, “Family of pH (low) insertion peptides for tumor targeting,” PNAS, Vol 110, No. 15 pp. 5834-5839, 2013.

Alexander G. Karabadzhak, Dhammika Weerakkody, Dayanjali Wijesinghe, Mak S. Thakur, Donald M. Engelman, Oleg A. Andreev, Vladislav S. Markin, and Yana K. Reshetnyak, “Modulation of the pHLIP Transmembrane Helix Insertion Pathway,” Biophysical Journal, vol. 102, pp. 1846-1855, 2012.

Francisco N. Barrera, Dhammika Weerakkody, Michael Anderson, Oleg A. Andreev, Yana K. Reshetnyak and Donald M. Engelman, “Roles of Carboxyl Groups in the Transmembrane Insertion of Peptides,” Journal of Molecular Biology, vol. 413, pp. 359-371, 2011.

A. Andreev, A. G. Karabadzhak, D. Weerakkody, G. O. Andreev, D. M. Engelman and Y. K. Reshetnyak, “pH (low) insertion peptide (pHLIP) inserts across a lipid bilayer as a helix and exits by a different path,” Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A, vol. 107, no. 9, pp. 4081-6, 2010.