Gideon Dreyfuss is an American biochemist, the Isaac Norris Professor of Biochemistry and Biophysics at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine, and an investigator of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute.
[1] Dreyfuss received his Ph.D. in biological chemistry in 1978 from Harvard University and is a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.
A primary research goal of the lab is to elucidate the function of Survival of Motor Neuron protein, SMN, which assembles a heptameric ring of Sm proteins on U snRNAs to form snRNPs that are essential components of the splicesome.
Moreover, loss of functional SMN is directly linked to spinal muscular atrophy, a debilitating neurodegenerative disease that is characterize by the eventual death of motor neurons and muscular wasting.
The Dreyfuss Lab is conducting research to understand the role of SMN in SMA pathology and using high throughput screening to discover potential therapeutics.