Mark van Raaij

My scientific career has developed at the interface of Biochemistry and Structural Biology. I did an
undergraduate project in the group of Barend Kraal (Leiden Univ) and collaborated with Jan Pieter
Abrahams, purifying translation factors and tRNAs from Escherichia coli to use them in enzymatic
assays, and for studying the EF-Tu/GMPPNP/aatRNA complex by NMR spectroscopy. After my
undergraduate degree, I started working as a non-clinical scientist in the laboratory of John Walker,
isolating mitochondria and purifying F1-ATPase for crystallization. From the crystals that I prepared,
the structure of the enzyme was solved. I also prepared expression vectors for the OSCP, F6 and inhibitor
subunits of ATP synthase. After one year, I obtained an MRC studentship and decided to start a PhD
degree. For my PhD I analysed different inhibitors of F1-ATPase. I determined the minimal inhibitory
sequence of the inhibitor subunit and co-crystallized F1-ATPase with aurovertin B and other inhibitors.
For my postdoc, I obtained a personal Marie Curie Biotech II fellowship and joined the group of
Stephen Cusack at the EMBL Grenoble outstation, working on the human adenovirus penton. I
determined structures for two domains of the human adenovirus 2 fibre and the structure of its receptor,
plus described the kinetic parameters for host cell receptor binding. In 2000, I joined Leiden University.
CV date 16/03/2025
2
I identified two stable fragments of the bacteriophage T4 short fibre and solved their structures. In 2002,
I went to the University of Santiago de Compostela and continued my crystallographic studies on viral
host cell interaction proteins. I solved the structures of two avian reovirus proteins, the phage Det7
tailspike and several adenovirus proteins. I had a very fruitful collaboration with the group of Mark
Overhand of Leiden University on crystallography of gramicidin S and synthetic analogues of it.
At the CSIC, I have continued my studies on virus and bacteriophage proteins. I also started another
collaboration with Concepcion Gonzalez-Bello, for whom we solved structures of enzymes from
pathogenic bacteria bound to the inhibitors they synthesize. Since 2010, I am at the CNB, where we
have solved structures of the C-terminal domains of the fibres of the phages T4, T7, T5, K, epsilon15,
S24-1, as well as those of several Atadenovirus, Siadenovirus, Aviadenovirus and Mastadenovirus
fibres. We have also collaborated to solve the structures of several phage endolysin proteins.
My current research interests centre on the structural biology of virus and bacteriophage proteins,
with a special focus on their receptor-binding spikes and fibres, and their host peptidoglycan degradation
endolysins.
I am a member of the Asociación para el Avance de la Ciencia y Tecnología en España (treasurer
2007-2012), the Asociación de Investigadores Ramón y Cajal (vice-president and treasurer 2005-2007),
the Asociación de Utilizadores de Sinchrotones España (AUSE), the Sociedad Española de Bioquímica
y Biología Molecular, the Sociedad Española de Virología, the International Union of Crystallography,
the European Crystallographic Association and the Grupo Especializado de Cristalografía y Crecimiento
Cristalino.
From 2012 to 2018 I was Academic Editor of PLoS One, between 2012 and 2017 Associate Editor
of Virology Journal, from 2017 to 2018 Deputy Section Editor of Virology Journal and since April 2017
I am a Main Editor of the IUCr journal Acta Crystallographica F. I am a member of the Project
Evaluation Committee of the EMBL Hamburg beamlines since 2019, was a member of the FWO BIO1
evaluation panel (Research Foundation Flanders) from 2019 to 2024 and of the ANR evaluation panel
“Caractérisation des structures et relations structure-fonctions des macromolécules biologiques (France)
from 2020 to 2023.
ResearcherID B-3678-2009; ORCID 0000-0002-4781-1375; Scopus ID 7003305911
Google Scholar: https://scholar.google.es/citations?user=-sqtkycAAAAJ&hl=en