marsiglia photo

Assistant Professor

Areas of Interest
Signal Transduction, PI3K-AKT signaling, chemical biology, protein-protein interactions, kinases, structural biology

Biography

Dr. Marsiglia received a BA in Music and BS in Biochemistry from SUNY Binghamton in 2013. He then earned his PhD in Chemistry at NYU using NMR spectroscopy to explore the activation mechanisms underlying pathogenic FGFR kinase domain mutations. During his postdoctoral work at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai starting in 2019, Dr. Marsiglia developed a NanoBRET assay that helped to elucidate the mechanism of action for the MEK inhibitor, Trametinib. In 2022, Dr. Marsiglia joined the Department of Pharmacology and Toxicology at the University of Alabama at Birmingham as an Assistant Professor.

  • Research Interests

    My chemical biology focused lab provides a multidisciplinary training environment for students and postdocs where they learn how to develop compounds and study them in biological systems using a combination of cell culture, structural biology, and synthetic-based techniques. My lab specifically develops NanoBRET-based assays to profile novel small molecule inhibitors targeting AKT-binding partner complexes, and structural characterization of those interactions. Our goal is to understand what AKT-binding partner interactions are important for AKT inhibitor efficacy, and design new drugs to take advantage of those interactions.

  • Selected Publications
    Marsiglia WM*, Khan ZM*, Real AM*, Chow A, Duffy ME, Yerabolu JR, Scopton AP, Dar AC. Structural basis for the action of the drug trametinib at KSR-bound MEK. Nature. 2020; 588(7838): 509-514.

    Marsiglia WM*, Lingfeng C*, Chen H*, Katigbak J, Erdjument-Bromage H, Kemble D, Fu L, Ma J, Sun G, Zhang Y, Liang G, Neubert T, Li X, Traaseth NJ*, Mohammadi M*. Molecular basis for receptor tyrosine kinase A-loop-tyrosine transphosphorylation. Nat Chem Biol. 2020: 3: 267-277

    Marsiglia WM, Katigbak J, Zheng S, Mohammadi M, Zhang Y, Traaseth NJ. A Conserved Allosteric pathway in Tyrosine Kinase Regulation. Structure. 2019; 27:1308-1315 e3.

    Marsiglia WM*, Chen H*, Cho M, Huang Z, Deng J, Blais S, Gai W, Bhattacharya S, Neubert T, Traaseth NJ*, Mohammadi M*. Elucidation of a Four-Switch Allosteric Network in FGF Receptor Tyrosine Kinases. eLife. 2017;6: pii: e21137. doi: 10.7554/eLife.21137

Education

Ph.D., New York University 

Postdoctoral Fellowships
Postdoctoral Fellow, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai

Contact

Office Location
Volker Hall 154

Phone
205-934-017

Email
wmmarsig@uab.edu

Website

www.marsiglialab.com