Tilman Baumstark, PhD
Tilman Baumstark, Ph. D.
Associate Professor of Biology
Department of Biological Sciences
Contact Info:
Office: STC 348
McNeil Science & Technology Center
Voice: (215) 596-7531
Fax: (215) 596-8710
Email: t.baumst@usp.edu
Training & Degrees
Ph.D., Biophysics, Institute of Biophysics at Heinrich-Heine University in Dusseldorf, Germany, 1997
M.S., Biology, Heinrich-Heine University in Dusseldorf, Germany, 1989
Prior Positions
Associate Research Professor of Biophysics, Univ. of the Sciences in Phila., 2007
Assistant Professor of Biology, Univ. of the Sciences in Phila., 2002
Postdoctoral Research Associate, Institute for Molecular Virology, University of Wisconsin, Madison, WI, 1997
Membership in Professional Organizations
RNA Society
American Society for Virology
Sigma Xi Research Society
American Association for the Advancement of Science
Research Interests
RNA Pathogens: Positive strand RNA viruses, satellites, viroids.
Assembly of the viral replication complex, role of RNA structure and RNA-protein interactions.
Yeast as a model host system to study pathogen replication, recombinant protein production and drug delivery.
Selected Recent Publications
Owens, R.A. and Baumstark, T. “Structural differences within the loop E motif imply alternative mechanisms of viroid processing”, RNA 13, 827-834 (2007)
Zhang, G., Zhang, J., George, A.T., Baumstark, T. and Simon, A.E. “Conformational changes involved in initiation of minus-strand synthesis of a virus-associated RNA. RNA 12, 147-162 (2006)
Schrader O, Baumstark T, and Riesner D. (2003). A mini-RNA containing the tetraloop, wobble-pair and loop E motifs of the central conserved region of potato spindle tuber viroid is processed into a minicircle. Nucleic Acids Res. 31, 988-998.
Baumstark T and Ahlquist P. (2001). The brome mosaic virus RNA3 intergenic replication enhancer folds to mimic a tRNA TYC-stem loop and is modified in vivo. RNA 7, 1652-1670.
Schröder ARW, Baumstark T, and Riesner D. (1998). Chemical mapping of coexisting RNA structures. Nucleic Acids Res. 26, 3449-3450.
Baumstark T, Schröder ARW, and Riesner D. (1997). Viroid processing: Switch from cleavage to ligation is driven by a change from a tetraloop to a loop E conformation. EMBO J. 16, 599-610.
Chen X, Baumstark T, Steger G, and Riesner D. (1995). Growth kinetics of potato spindle tuber viroid (PSTVd) replication products in the host plant. Biol Chem. Hoppe Seyler 376 (Suppl.), 90.
Chen X, Baumstark T, Steger G, and Riesner D. (1995). High resolution SSCP by optimization of the temperature by transverse TGGE. Nucleic Acids Res. 23, 4524 4525.
Baumstark T and Riesner D. (1995). Only one of four possible secondary structures of the central conserved region of potato spindle tuber viroid is a substrate for processing in a potato nuclear extract. Nucleic Acids Res. 23, 4246-4254.
Matousek J, Schröder ARW, Trena L, Reimers M, Baumstark T, Dedic P, Vlasak J, Becker I, Kreuzaler F, Fladung M, and Riesner D. (1994). Inhibition of viroid infection by antisense RNA expression in transgenic plants. Biol. Chem. Hoppe Seyler 375, 765-777.
Riesner D, Baumstark T, Qu F, Klahn T, Loss P, Rosenbaum V, Schmitz M, and Steger G. (1992). Physical basis and biological examples of metastable RNA structures. In Structural Tools for the Analysis of Protein-Nucleic Acid Complexes’ (D. Lilley, H. Heumann and D. Suck, Ed.) Advances in Life Sciences, Birkhaeuser Verlag AG, Basel, 401-435.
Steger G, Baumstark T, Mörchen M, Tabler T, Tsagris M, Saenger HL, and Riesner D. (1992). Structural requirements for viroid processing by RNase T1. J. Mol. Biol. 227, 719-737.