Khalid, Professor Syma

Academic background

Professor Syma Khalid is the Tutorial Fellow in Biochemistry at St Anne’s College. Syma graduated with a first class degree in Chemistry from the University of Warwick in 2000. She remained at Warwick to read for a PhD. She moved to the University of Oxford as a postdoc in 2003, to study the structure-function relationship of bacterial membrane proteins. After 15 years as a group leader at the University of Southampton,  she returned to Oxford in 2021 as Professor of Computational Microbiology at the Department of Biochemistry.  She has ~20 years of experience in the development and application of molecular dynamics simulations to the study of biological molecules. Starting her own group, she noticed the molecular models of bacterial membranes were usually missing key biochemical details (e.g. lipid type, macromolecular crowding) and has worked to address this ever since.

MChem, Warwick Univeristy, 2000

PhD, Warwick University, 2004

Teaching

She teaches undergraduate and graduate Biochemistry. 

Research interests

Bacterial cell envelopes, membrane proteins, molecular simulations, bacterial cell wall

Recent Publications

2021

Mann D, Fan J, Somboon K, Farrell DP, Muenks A, Tzokov SB, DiMaio F, Khalid S, Miller SI, Bergeron JRC. (2021) Structure and lipid dynamics in the maintenance of lipid asymmetry inner membrane complex of A. baumannii. Commun Biol. https://doi.org/10.1038/s42003-021-02318-4

York A, Lloyd AJ, del Genio CI, Shearer J, Hinxman KJ, Fritz K, Fulop V, Khalid S, Dowson C, Roper D. (2021) Structure-based modelling and dynamics of MurM, a Streptococcus pneumoniae penicillin resistance determinant that functions at the cytoplasmic membrane interface. Structure. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.str.2021.03.001

Pedebos C, Smith IPS, Boags A, Khalid S. (2021). The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Periplasm: Unexpected Molecular Interactions of Polymyxin B1 in E. coli. Structure. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.str.2021.01.009

Gao Y, Lee J, Smith IPS, Lee H, Kim S, Qi Y, Klauda JB, Widmalm G, Khalid S, Im W. (2021) “CHARMM-GUI Supports Hydrogen Mass Repartitioning and Different Protonation States of Phosphates in Lipopolysaccharides”. J Chem Inf Model. https://doi.org/10.1021/acs.jcim.0c01360

Rattu P, Belzunces B, Haynes T, Skylaris CK, Khalid S. (2021) “Translocation of flexible and tensioned ssDNA through in silico designed hydrophobic nanopores with two constrictions”. Nanoscale. https://doi.org/10.1039/d0nr04890a

Lizio MG, Campana M, De Poli M, Jefferies DF, Cullen W, Andrushchenko V, Chmel NP, Bouř P, Khalid S, Clayden J, Blanch E, Rodger A, Webb SJ. (2021) “Insight into mechanism of action and peptide-membrane interactions of Aib-rich peptides: multi-technique experimental and theoretical analysis”. ChemBioChem. https://doi.org/10.1002/cbic.202000834