Dr. Michal Sharon

Dr. Michal Sharon earned a BSc at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem (1996) and a PhD in the Weizmann Institute’s Department of Structural Biology in 2003. She conducted her postdoctoral research at University of Cambridge, UK, where, in 2006, she was elected as a Research Fellow at Clare Hall College. She joined the Department of Biological Chemistry at the Weizmann Institute in 2007. She is the incumbent of the Elaine Blond Career Development Chair in Perpetuity.
Dr. Sharon uses novel techniques in mass spectrometry to examine the Signalosome complex. This protein complex, made out of eight subunits, is essential for all living cells, from yeast to humans. It is multi-functional, involved in a variety of biological processes, such as cell growth, DNA repair, and programmed cell death. It has also been linked to many types of cancer, a significant number of which have poor prognoses. To date, little is known about the Signalosome complex’s mechanism of operation, and how it affects so many essential, cellular processes; Prof. Sharon’s team is researching how this complex is organized structurally and how changes to its structure affect its function. To this end, her team is employing a novel technique called “structural mass spectrometry” which enables precise measurement of the mass of biological macromolecules and the extraction of valuable information from these measurements regarding their architecture.
Dr. Sharon is a recipient of European Research Council Starting Grant and an Israel Cancer Research Fund Research Career Development Award.
Dr. Sharon has a son and two daughters and in her free time likes to read, travel, and draw.