Jim, Ty and Dan are experienced structural biologists and protein biochemists with over fifty-five years of experience in clotting proteins and complexes. Achievements of note include: the structure of the serpin-protease complex (Nature 2000); structures of antithrombin, heparin cofactor II, protein C inhibitor and protease nexin 1 in complex with cofactors and proteases (NSMB, PNAS, Blood, Embo Journal, etc…); the structure of serpin polymers (Nature 2008); and multiple papers on thrombin structure (PNAS, Structure, etc). In 2013, the team published the landmark crystal structure of an assembled prothrombinase complex, consisting of factors V and X from the venom of a snake (Blood 2013).
Richard and Jim worked together at XO1 Limited, a company that developed a novel antithrombotic monoclonal antibody called ichorcumab. XO1 was acquired in 2015 by Janssen Pharmaceuticals.
Dr. Ty Adams
Ty Adams
Founder and Director
From 1992 to 1998, Ty worked for biotechnology startup Metabolex purifying small molecule natural compounds involved in increasing insulin potentiation and insulin signaling. Ty received his PhD from University of Vermont in 2004 under the supervision of Stephen Everse and Kenneth Mann (one of the fathers of modern protein haematology) for solving crystal structure of bovine factor Vai. Ty went on to work with Jim Huntington at the University of Cambridge, studying various systems of the coagulation cascade, including the thrombin-thrombomodulin complex and the prothrombinase complex.
James A Huntington
Founder and Director
Jim Huntington graduated in 1989 from the University of Kansas with bachelors degrees in chemistry and mathematics. While an undergraduate, he worked as a research assistant in the Pharmaceutical Chemistry Department and at the Merck subsidiary InterX under Takeru Higuchi, Ooi Wong and Jose Alexander. His research focussed on chemical synthesis and testing of prodrugs and prodrug-like enhancers of skin permeability. After graduating, he was employed as a chemist at Alza Corporation in California for three years evaluating compounds that enhanced the electrotransport of drugs across the skin. He obtained a PhD from Vanderbilt University in 1997 for work on the biophysical characterisation of members of the serpin family of proteins with Peter Gettins. His research on the serpins continued during his postdoc with Robin Carrell at the University of Cambridge, where he used X-ray crystallography to determine the mechanisms of serpin function. He was appointed principal investigator at the Cambridge Institute for Medical Research in 1999, University Reader in 2007 and Professor in 2011. His research focuses on serpin function and dysfunction, and on the regulation of blood coagulation. He has founded five biotech companies, including XO1 (recently acquired by Janssen Pharmaceuticals), AcpinteX (formerly Serpin Haemostatics), Z Factor, SuperX and Cambridge Protein Works.
Professor James A Huntington
Daniel J.D. Johnson
Dan Johnson
Founder and Director
Dan worked from 1989 to 2002 for the Medical Research Council in the Haemostasis Research Group, led by Ted Tuddenham. During his time there he worked on expression, purification and characterisation of various coagulation factors, either patient-derived for the characterisation of disease causing mutations, or recombinant protein for biochemical analysis and crystallography. In particular he worked on factor VIII and the fVIIa/tissue factor complex and crystallised FVIIa. In 2002 he joined Jim Huntington’s group at the University of Cambridge to continue work in the coagulation field. Here he continued to hone his protein expression, purification and crystallography skills, resulting in crystal structures of antithrombin in encounter complexes with all of its key target proteases (thrombin, factor Xa and factor IXa), and with heparin, various antithrombin mutants and sodium-free thrombin. Dan has also developed advanced techniques for high level expression of labelled recombinant proteins for NMR studies.