Emad Tajkhorshid

Emad Tajkhorshid serves as the J. Woodland Hastings Endowed Chair in the Department of Biochemistry at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. He holds multiple appointments across the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences (Biochemistry, Chemistry), College of Engineering (Bioengineering), and the Carle-Illinois College of Medicine, while also being a full-time faculty member at the Beckman Institute for Advanced Science and Technology. His primary academic home is in the Department of Biochemistry within the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences.

Dr. Tajkhorshid earned his B.S. from Tehran University in 1989, completed his Ph.D. at the University of Heidelberg in 2001, and conducted postdoctoral research at the University of Illinois from 2000-2003. He joined the UIUC faculty in 2007 and was fast-tracked to associate professor with tenure in 2010, then promoted to full professor in 2013.

His research focuses on computational structural biology and molecular biophysics, particularly developing advanced computational techniques to characterize biological phenomena at the molecular level, with special emphasis on membranes and membrane proteins. His work bridges computational methodology development with biological applications in drug discovery, infectious diseases, ion channels, membrane biology, molecular pharmacology, neuroscience, protein biochemistry, signal transduction, and virology. His research group has made significant contributions to understanding the structural and dynamical bases underlying biological function in membrane systems.

Analysis of his recent publications reveals a strong trend toward increasingly sophisticated computational approaches to study membrane proteins and transporters, with growing integration of cryo-EM data, molecular dynamics simulations across multiple scales, and investigations of lipid-protein interactions. His work spans from fundamental biophysical questions to translational applications in drug discovery and disease mechanisms.

• NIH Transformative Award (2017-2022)
• Endowed Chair of Biochemistry (2016-present)
• MCB Faculty Excellence Award (2016)
• University of Illinois Scholar (2015-2018)
• UIUC top tenure packages of the year (2010)
• Thomas E. Thompson Award (2020)

Dr. Tajkhorshid has authored nearly 300 research articles with an H-index of 78 and over 37,000 citations in high-impact journals including Nature, Science, Cell, eLife, and PNAS. His research has enjoyed continuous support from multiple federal funding agencies including NIH, NSF, DOE, and DOD. He directs the NIH Center for Macromolecular Modeling and Bioinformatics and leads the Computational Structural Biology and Molecular Biophysics Group at the Beckman Institute. He has delivered nearly 200 invited lectures worldwide and served on editorial boards of major journals including Biophysical Journal, Journal of Biological Chemistry, PLoS Computational Biology, and Biochemical and Biophysical Research Communication.

His laboratory, the Computational Structural Biology and Molecular Biophysics Group, is a major hub for computational biophysics research at the Beckman Institute, focusing on developing and applying advanced computational techniques to achieve detailed microscopic views of structural and dynamical bases underlying biological function, particularly in membrane systems. The group's work has significant implications for understanding fundamental biological processes and developing new therapeutic approaches.