Associate Professor Ulrich Bommer, Theme Leader Medical Sciences

Associate Professor Ulrich-Axel Bommer was appointed to the Graduate School of Medicine in October 2006 as the Director of the Division of Medical Sciences. At this time he joined the University of Wollongong, moving to Australia from London. 

Ulrich obtained his first degree from Martin-Luther-University in Halle, Germany, in 1971, and his PhD in Biochemistry from the same University in 1974. He joined the Department of Cell Physiology at the Institute for Molecular Biology of the Academy of Sciences in Berlin-Buch, one of the leading research institutions in East Germany at the time. In Berlin, his main research interest was the structural and functional characterisation of initiation complexes of the eukaryotic ribosome, the cellular machine necessary for protein synthesis and for decoding of the genetic message. The results of this work formed the core of his thesis for ‘habilitation’, the German second higher degree, which he obtained in 1989.

After the fall of the Berlin Wall, Ulrich launched his international career by obtaining a short-term fellowship from the Human Frontier Science Program in Strasbourg, which enabled him to perform a research project in the Laboratory of Professor Nahum Sonenberg at McGill University in Montreal, Canada, in 1991. In the same year, he moved to the UK, where he joined St. George’s Hospital Medical School at the University of London as Lecturer and later Senior Lecturer in Biochemistry.

In London, Ulrich’s research interests extended from pure mechanistic studies on ribosomes into the area of translational regulation of gene expression. He studied both mechanisms of translational control and the regulation of specific proteins under a variety of cell physiological conditions, such as entry of cells into the cell cycle or cell stress conditions that lead to induction of apoptosis. In particular, he investigated the role and regulation of the translationally controlled tumour protein TCTP, which is involved in a variety of cell biological and disease processes.

Ulrich has wide-ranging experience in Basic Medical Sciences education for both Medical and Science degree courses. At St. George’s Hospital Medical School in London, he was a founding member of the group that developed the Biomedical Science degree course, and he served later as the director of the first year of this course. He had exposure to various ‘philosophies’ in Medical Education, from the pure problem-based learning approach in the Graduate Entry Program at St. George’s to the very traditional approach at St. Christopher’s College of Medicine, where he served temporarily as Associate Dean of Basic Medical Sciences. He particularly enjoys the integrated MBBS curriculum at Wollongong, and he is proud of being part of the team that develops this novel medical degree course. He thoroughly enjoys cross-discipline teaching in a range of different disciplines, such as Biochemistry, Physiology, Pathology, Immunology, Genetics and Microbiology.

Ulrich is member of various professional bodies, such as the ‚Gesellschaft für Biochemie und Molekularbiologie’ and  the ‚Deutsche Hochschulverband’ in Germany, as well as the Biochemical Society and the Higher Education Academy in the UK.

Key Publications

Wang X, Fonseca BD, Tang H, Liu R, Elia A, Clemens MJ, Bommer UA, Proud CG. Re-evaluating the roles of proposed modulators of mammalian target of rapamycin complex 1 (mTORC1) signaling. J Biol Chem. 2008, Aug 1. [Epub ahead of print]

Bommer, UA & Stahl, J. Ribosomal Proteins in Eukaryotes. Encyclopedia of Life Sciences (pp. 1-13) www.els.net : John Wiley & Sons 2005. Review

Bommer UA, Thiele BJ. The translationally controlled tumour protein (TCTP). Int J Biochem Cell Biol. 2004. 36(3):379-85. Review.

Bommer UA, Borovjagin AV, Greagg MA, Jeffrey IW, Russell P, Laing KG, Lee M, Clemens MJ. The mRNA of the translationally controlled tumor protein P23/TCTP is a highly structured RNA, which activates the dsRNA-dependent protein kinase PKR. RNA. 2002. 8(4):478-96.

Clemens MJ, Bommer UA. Translational control: the cancer connection. Int J Biochem Cell Biol. 1999. 31(1):1-23. Review.

Gachet Y, Tournier S, Lee M, Lazaris-Karatzas A, Poulton T, Bommer UA. The growth-related, translationally controlled protein P23 has properties of a tubulin binding protein and associates transiently with microtubules during the cell cycle. J Cell Sci. 1999. 112:1257-71.

Bommer, UA, Burkhardt, N, Jünemann, R, Spahn, CMT, Triana, F, Nierhaus, KH, Ribosomes and polysomes. In: Cell Fractionation: A Practical Approach. (J. Graham and D. Rickwood, eds., Oxford University Press 1997) pp.271-301.

Bommer UA, Lazaris-Karatzas A, De Benedetti A, Nürnberg P, Benndorf R, Bielka H, Sonenberg N. Translational regulation of the mammalian growth-related protein P23: involvement of eIF-4E. Cell Mol Biol Res. 1994, 40(7-8):633-41.

Bommer UA, Kraft R, Kurzchalia TV, Price NT, Proud CG. Amino acid sequence analysis of the beta- and gamma-subunits of eukaryotic initiation factor eIF-2. Identification of regions interacting with GTP. Biochim Biophys Acta. 1991 1079(3):308-15.

Bommer UA, Lutsch G, Stahl J, Bielka H. Eukaryotic initiation factors eIF-2 and eIF-3: interactions, structure and localization in ribosomal initiation complexes. Biochimie. 1991 Jul-Aug;73(7-8):1007-19. Review.

Searchable RIS publications from 2000 to date

Email addresses are in the form alias@uow.edu.au

Last reviewed: 29 September, 2008