Congratulations Xiao Peng! The 2020 Ross Hallett Memorial Scholarship in Biophysics Winner

Peng Xiao obtained his BSc in Physics from Beijing University, and his MSc in Condensed Matter Physics from Brock University. He began his PhD in Biophysics at the University of Guelph in 2016, determining, at the atomic level, how membrane proteins fold into their functional states. This subject is both of fundamental importance and of medical relevance, as membrane protein misfolding is associated with many debilitating disorders. Xiao combined hydrogen-deuterium exchange solid-state NMR with a battery of complementary biophysical methods, to determine the sequence of structural transitions associated with unfolding of Anabaena Sensory Rhodopsin (ASR). His results were recently published in Nature Communications, and his paper was recommended in F1000Prime as being of special significance in the field.