Michael N. Hall

Michael Nip Hall[1]
Michael N. Hall in 2014
Born (1953-06-12) June 12, 1953 (age 71)[2]
Puerto Rico[3]
NationalitySwiss
American
EducationUniversity of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (BS)
Harvard University (PhD)
Known forDiscovery and research of TOR
AwardsBalzan Prize
Sjöberg Prize
Albert Lasker Award for Basic Medical Research
Szent-Györgyi Prize 
Canada Gairdner International Award
Breakthrough Prize in Life Sciences
Sir Hans Krebs Medal
Marcel Benoist Prize
Louis-Jeantet Prize for Medicine
Scientific career
FieldsMolecular biology
InstitutionsUniversity of Basel
University of California, San Francisco
Pasteur Institute
ThesisGenetic studies on the regulation of the major outer membrane porin proteins of Escherichia coli K-12 (1981)
Doctoral advisorThomas J. Silhavy

Michael Nip Hall (born 12 June 1953) is an American-Swiss molecular biologist and professor at the Biozentrum of the University of Basel, Switzerland.[4] He discovered TOR, a protein central for regulating cell growth.

Early life and education

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Hall was born in Puerto Rico. His parents liked Latin American culture, so they moved to Peru when he was three years old, and then to Venezuela a few years later.[5] When Hall was 13, he went to the United States for boarding school, at St. Mark's School in Southborough, Massachusetts.[4][5]

Hall entered the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill as an arts major, but switched to zoology as he wanted to study medicine,[5] earning his BSc in 1976.[2] He found out he was not attracted to medicine after working at a local hospital, and turned to research when working on his undergraduate honors thesis in a molecular genetics laboratory.[5] Hall obtained his PhD from Harvard University in 1981.[2]

Career

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Hall was intrigued with the research of François Jacob and Jacques Monod on bacterial genetics, and so he went to the Pasteur Institute in Paris as a research fellow in 1981 for eight months.[5] He then joined Ira Herskowitz's group at the University of California, San Francisco as a postdoctoral fellow. He became a principal investigator in 1984, leading his own research group.[4]

In 1987, Hall moved to Basel, Switzerland, and joined the Division of Biochemistry of the Biozentrum, University of Basel, as an assistant professor.[4] He was promoted to professor in 1992.[2]

Hall was twice appointed Vice Director of the Biozentrum, from 2002 to 2009 and from 2013 to 2016.[4] He was also Chairman of the European Molecular Biology Organization Council between 2021 and 2022, served on the Council from 2017 to 2019 and again from 2020 to 2022.[6]

Currently, Hall serves on the Board of Trustees of the Louis-Jeantet Foundation.[7]

Research

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Hall is a pioneer in the PI3K/AKT/mTOR pathway and cell growth control, and is best known for discovering mTOR. In 1991, Hall seminally discovered two genes that, when mutated, made rapamycin unable to inhibit cell growth in yeasts.[8] Hall named them TOR1 and TOR2, short for "Target of Rapamycin",[9] which his group also sequenced and characterized.[10][11]

Three years later, Stuart Schreiber identified the mammalian counterpart of TOR, known as the "mammalian target of rapamycin" (mTOR).[12] The gene and the protein it encodes are later renamed the "mechanistic target of rapamycin", while the short form remains mTOR.[13]

The protein encoded by the TOR (and mTOR) gene is a protein kinase activated by growth factors, nutrients, and insulin. It is a central controller of cell growth and metabolism. The TOR protein plays a key role in aging and the development of diseases such as cancer, obesity, diabetes, and cardiovascular disease.[14]

After the discovering TOR, Hall continued studying the function and regulation of TOR and mTOR in yeasts and humans. His group was the first to recognize that yeast TOR1 and TOR2 proteins can form two protein complexes (known as TORC1 and TORC2) with distinct functions and compositions.[15] They went on to show the mammalian counterpart of TORC2 (named mTORC2) is not inhibited by rapamycin and regulates a different signaling pathway from mTORC1.[16]

Hall also identified many roles of mTORC1 and mTORC2, including ribosomes physically interact with and activate mTORC2,[17] glutamine breakdown stimulates mTORC1,[18] and mTORC2 promotes lipid synthesis and cancer.[19] Collaborating with Nenad Ban and Timm Maier, Hall reported the structures of mTORC1 in 2016[20] and mTORC2 in 2018.[21]

Awards and honors

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References

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  1. ^ a b "Debrecen Award for Molecular Medicine 2016". University of Debrecen. Archived from the original on February 24, 2023. Retrieved February 24, 2023.
  2. ^ a b c d "Charles Rodolphe Brupbacher Prize for Cancer Research 2019" (PDF). Charles Rodolphe Brupbacher Foundation. Archived from the original (PDF) on February 23, 2023. Retrieved February 23, 2023.
  3. ^ a b "Michael N. Hall". National Academy of Sciences. Archived from the original on February 24, 2023. Retrieved February 24, 2023.
  4. ^ a b c d e "CV of Prof. Dr. Michael N. Hall". Biozentrum University of Basel. Retrieved May 15, 2023.
  5. ^ a b c d e Neill, Ushma S. (2017). "A conversation with Michael Hall". Journal of Clinical Investigation. 127 (11): 3916–3917. doi:10.1172/JCI97760. PMC 5663369. PMID 29091075. Archived from the original on March 2, 2023. Retrieved March 2, 2023.
  6. ^ "Council". European Molecular Biology Organization. March 22, 2021. Archived from the original on November 29, 2022. Retrieved November 29, 2022.
  7. ^ "The members of the Board of Trustees". Louis-Jeantet Foundation. December 7, 2017. Archived from the original on March 7, 2023. Retrieved March 7, 2023.
  8. ^ Heitman, Joseph; Movva, N. Rao; Hall, Michael N. (1991). "Targets for cell cycle arrest by the immunosuppressant rapamycin in yeast". Science. 253 (5022): 905–909. Bibcode:1991Sci...253..905H. doi:10.1126/science.1715094. PMID 1715094. S2CID 9937225.
  9. ^ Hall, Michael N. (2017). "An Amazing Turn of Events". Cell. 171 (1): 18–22. doi:10.1016/j.cell.2017.08.021. PMID 28888325. S2CID 26247385.
  10. ^ Kunz, Jeannette; Henriquez, Ruben; Schneider, Ulrich; Deuter-Reinhard, Maja; Movva, N. Rao; Hall, Michael N. (1993). "Target of rapamycin in yeast, TOR2, is an essential phosphatidylinositol kinase homolog required for G1 progression". Cell. 73 (7): 585–596. doi:10.1016/0092-8674(93)90144-F. PMID 8387896. S2CID 42926249. Retrieved March 13, 2023.
  11. ^ Helliwell, Stephen B.; Wagner, Philipp; Kunz, Jeannette; Deuter-Reinhard, Maja; Henriquez, Ruben; Hall, Michael N. (1994). "TOR1 and TOR2 Are Structurally and Functionally Similar but not Identical Phosphatidylinositol Kinase Homologues in Yeast". Molecular Biology of the Cell. 5 (1): 105–118. doi:10.1091/mbc.5.1.105. PMC 301013. PMID 8186460.
  12. ^ Brown, Eric J.; Albers, Mark W.; Shin, Tae Bum; Ichikawa, Kazuo; Keith, Curtis T.; Lane, William S.; Schreiber, Stuart L. (1994). "A mammalian protein targeted by G1-arresting rapamycin-receptor complex". Nature. 369 (6483): 756–8. Bibcode:1994Natur.369..756B. doi:10.1038/369756a0. PMID 8008069. S2CID 4359651. Retrieved March 10, 2023.
  13. ^ Kennedy, Brian K.; Lamming, Dudley W. (2016). "The Mechanistic Target of Rapamycin: The Grand ConducTOR of Metabolism and Aging". Cell Metabolism. 23 (6): 990–1003. doi:10.1016/j.cmet.2016.05.009. PMC 4910876. PMID 27304501.
  14. ^ Saxton, Robert A.; Sabatini, David M. (2017). "mTOR Signaling in Growth, Metabolism, and Disease". Cell. 168 (6): 960–976. doi:10.1016/j.cell.2017.02.004. PMC 5394987. PMID 28283069.
  15. ^ Loewith, Robbie; Jacinto, Estela; Wullschleger, Stephan; Lorberg, Anja; Crespo, José L.; Bonenfant, Débora; Oppliger, Wolfgang; Jenoe, Paul; Hall, Michael N. (2002). "Two TOR Complexes, Only One of which Is Rapamycin Sensitive, Have Distinct Roles in Cell Growth Control". Molecular Cell. 10 (3): 457–468. doi:10.1016/S1097-2765(02)00636-6. PMID 12408816.
  16. ^ Jacinto, Estela; Loewith, Robbie; Schmidt, Anja; Lin, Shuo; Rüegg, Markus A.; Hall, Alan; Hall, Michael N. (2004). "Mammalian TOR complex 2 controls the actin cytoskeleton and is rapamycin insensitive". Nature Cell Biology. 6 (11): 1122–1128. doi:10.1038/ncb1183. PMID 15467718. S2CID 13831153. Retrieved March 13, 2023.
  17. ^ Zinzalla, Vittoria; Stracka, Daniele; Oppliger, Wolfgang; Hall, Michael N. (2011). "Activation of mTORC2 by Association with the Ribosome". Cell. 144 (5): 757–768. doi:10.1016/j.cell.2011.02.014. PMID 21376236. S2CID 6454568.
  18. ^ Durán, Raúl V.; Oppliger, Wolfgang; Robitaille, Aaron M.; Heiserich, Lisa; Skendaj, Roswitha; Gottlieb, Eyal; Hall, Michael N. (2012). "Glutaminolysis Activates Rag-mTORC1 Signaling". Molecular Cell. 47 (3): 349–358. doi:10.1016/j.molcel.2012.05.043. PMID 22749528.
  19. ^ Guri, Yakir; Colombi, Marco; Dazert, Eva; Hindupur, Sravanth K.; Roszik, Jason; Moes, Suzette; Jenoe, Paul; Heim, Markus H.; Riezman, Isabelle; Riezman, Howard; Hall, Michael N. (2017). "mTORC2 Promotes Tumorigenesis via Lipid Synthesis". Cancer Cell. 32 (6): 807–823. doi:10.1016/j.ccell.2017.11.011. PMID 29232555.
  20. ^ Aylett, Christopher H. S.; Sauer, Evelyn; Imseng, Stefan; Boehringer, Daniel; Hall, Michael N.; Ban, Nenad; Maier, Timm (2016). "Architecture of human mTOR complex 1". Science. 351 (6268): 48–52. Bibcode:2016Sci...351...48A. doi:10.1126/science.aaa3870. PMID 26678875. S2CID 32663149. Retrieved March 14, 2023.
  21. ^ Stuttfeld, Edward; Aylett, Christopher H. S.; Imseng, Stefan; Boehringer, Daniel; Scaiola, Alain; Sauer, Evelyn; Hall, Michael N.; Maier, Timm; Ban, Nenad (2018). "Architecture of the human mTORC2 core complex". eLife. 7: e33101. doi:10.7554/eLife.33101. PMC 5837792. PMID 29424687.
  22. ^ "Michael N. Hall". European Molecular Biology Organization. Archived from the original on November 27, 2022. Retrieved February 26, 2023.
  23. ^ Hall, Michael N. "TOR SIGNALLING: FROM BENCH TO BEDSIDE" (PDF). Max Cloëtta Foundation. Archived from the original (PDF) on February 26, 2023. Retrieved February 26, 2023.
  24. ^ "Elected Fellows". American Association for the Advancement of Science. Archived from the original on February 26, 2023. Retrieved February 26, 2023.
  25. ^ "Professor Michael N. HALL". Louis-Jeantet Foundation. October 2017. Archived from the original on February 26, 2023. Retrieved February 26, 2023.
  26. ^ "Past laureates". Marcel Benoist Prize. Archived from the original on February 26, 2023. Retrieved February 26, 2023.
  27. ^ "Senate of the SAMS: Individual members since 1992" (PDF). Swiss Academy of Medical Sciences. Archived from the original (PDF) on February 27, 2023. Retrieved February 27, 2023.
  28. ^ "Plenary Lectures". Federation of European Biochemical Societies. Archived from the original on December 16, 2014. Retrieved December 16, 2014.
  29. ^ "Michael N. Hall". Breakthrough Prize in Life Sciences. Archived from the original on January 16, 2023. Retrieved January 16, 2023.
  30. ^ "Michael N. Hall". Gairdner Foundation. Archived from the original on February 28, 2023. Retrieved February 28, 2023.
  31. ^ "2017 Prize: Michael N. Hall, Ph.D." National Foundation for Cancer Research. April 26, 2016. Archived from the original on February 28, 2023. Retrieved February 28, 2023.
  32. ^ "2017 Albert Lasker Basic Medical Research Award". Lasker Foundation. Archived from the original on February 28, 2023. Retrieved February 28, 2023.
  33. ^ "2019 - Michael Hall". Human Frontier Science Program. Archived from the original on March 1, 2023. Retrieved March 1, 2023.
  34. ^ "Michael N. Hall". BBVA Foundation Frontiers of Knowledge Award. Archived from the original on March 1, 2023. Retrieved March 1, 2023.
  35. ^ "Sjöberg Prize awarded for decisive discoveries about cell growth" (Press release). Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences. February 3, 2020. Archived from the original on March 1, 2023. Retrieved March 1, 2023.
  36. ^ "Michael N. Hall, Balzan Price for Biological Mechanisms of Ageing". balzan.org. Retrieved September 9, 2024.
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