OlallaLab

The ChemBio Group of Olalla Vázquez!

Our young research group develops chemical biology tools based on our genuine ability to combine organic chemistry and biological approaches. We are located in the Chemistry Department at Marburg University. Besides, we also are part of Synmikro & Max Planck IMPRS-MIC

Join the Team! Publications

Research

The passion for studying life by chemistry!

Our multidisciplinary research strives to understand biological processes at the molecular level to elucidate the fundamental problems at the interface of chemistry and biology. For this purpose, we focus on the design and development of innovative chemical tools for sensing biological processes and remotely manipulate molecular machines inside cells. Our work embraces the synthesis of low molecular weight drug-like molecules, peptides and nucleic acids combined with the methodology to investigate physiological responses. Thus, our optochemical tools have been able of achieving conditional and selective biological modulation by taking full advantage of photosensitive molecules

Fluorophores

Our far-red compound 6-TramTO-3 enables fast and reliable fluorescent labelling of multi-resistant bacteria without genetic modification. Angew. Chem. Int. Ed. Engl., 2018, 57, 11564
Filed Patents: EP18174086.1 EP21192451.9

Photoswitches

Our optoepigenetic tools reversibly photomodulate either histone methyltransferase activity or nucleosome assembly.
Chem. Sci., 2017, 8, 4612
ACS Cent. Sci. 2022, 8, 57

Photosensitizers

Our novel halogenated BODIPY‐tetrazine probes simultaneously allows specific subcellular localization and conditional singlet oxygen generation.
Angew. Chem. Int. Ed. Engl. 2019, 58, 12868
Chemistry, 2020, 26, 10014

About

During all these years synthesizing new molecules and studying their behavior in biological systems, I did fall in love with science! Indeed, it is that sense of wonder and excitement with chemistry what has brought me here and drives me forward as a scientist. I believe the world can change for the better through science. In particular, we, as chemists, are in a unique position to address biological problems because chemistry is the underlying language that explains life.