Education

Postdoctoral Fellow - University of Utah (2007)
Ph.D. - The University of Queensland, Australia (2002)
B.S. - The University of Queensland, Australia (1996)

Research & Teaching Interests

My research is focused on the mechanisms for the recruitment of metals into mitochondria and their subsequent insertion, as cofactors, into the multi-subunit complexes of the electron transport chain. The majority of the studies use the model organism Saccharomyces cerevisiae with a combination of protein chemistry and genetics. Mitochondrial dysfunction is a common element of most human disease, so insight gleaned from the assembly process in yeast is crucial to understanding many pathophysiological states. I teach the fundamentals of microbiology in BIOL3200 General Microbiology.

Selected Publications

F. Pierrel, O. Khalimonchuk, P.A. Cobine, M. Bestwick and D.R. Winge (2008) Coa2 is an assembly factor for yeast cytochrome c oxidase biogenesis facilitating the maturation of Cox1. Mol. Cell. Biol., 28:4927-4939. 

K.M. Rigby, P.A. Cobine, O. Khalimonchuk and D.R. Winge (2008) Mapping the functional interaction of Sco1 and Cox2 in cytochrome oxidase biogenesis. J. Biol. Chem., 283:15015-15022.

F. Pierrel, M. L. Bestwick, P.A. Cobine, O.Khalimonchuk, J.A. Cricco and D.R. Winge (2007) Coa1 links Mss51 post-translational function to cofactor insertion in cytochrome c oxidase assembly. EMBO J., 26:4335–4346.

S.C. Leary, P.A. Cobine, B.A. Kaufman, G. Guercin, A.Mattman, J. Palaty, G. Lockitch, D.R. Winge, P. Rustin, R. Horvath, and E. A. Shoubridge (2007) The human cytochrome c oxidase assembly factors SCO1 and SCO2 have additional roles in the regulation of cellular copper homeostasis. Cell Metab., 5:9-20.

P.A. Cobine, F. Pierrel, M.L. Bestwick and D.R. Winge (2006) Mitochondrial matrix copper complex used in metallation of cytochrome oxidase and superoxide dismutase. J. Biol. Chem., 281:36552-36559.

M. Yang, P.A. Cobine, A. Naranuntarat, S. Molik, R. Lill, D.R. Winge and V.C. Culotta (2006) The effects of mitochondrial iron homeostasis on co-factor specificity of superoxide dismutase 2. EMBO J., 25:1775-1783.
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P.A. Cobine, F. Pierrel, S.C. Leary, F. Sasarman, Y-C. Horng, E.A. Shoubridge and D.R. Winge (2006) The P174L mutation in human Sco1 severely compromises Cox17-dependent metallation but does not impair copper binding. J. Biol. Chem., 281:12270-12276.

Courses