Assistant Professor, Department of Biology; Department of Chemistry and Chemical Biology
Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute

Education:
Ph.D., Biochemistry, with Honors, National Autonomous University of Mexico, 1990
M.S., Biochemistry, National Autonomous University of Mexico, 1987
B.S., Chemistry, National Autonomous University of Mexico, 1985

Career Highlights:
Barquera began her professional career as a postdoctoral fellow in the Department of Biochemistry at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Four years later, she returned to her alma mater, the National Autonomous University of Mexico, to spend a year as a tenure-tracked professor in the Institute of Cellular Physiology. She then joined the University of Helsinki in 1995, where she spent three years as a research scientist in the medical chemistry department. In 1998, Barquera returned to the University of Illinois, where she worked four years as a research associate and two years as a research assistant professor. She joined the Rensselaer Department of Biology in the fall of 2004 as an assistant professor.

Among the awards she has received include a Fogarty Fellowship from the National Institutes of Health.

Research Areas:
Barquera’s group is studying the bacterium Vibrio cholerae, the agent of the disease cholera. Her team aims to understand the physiology and biochemistry that gives this bacterium the ability to propagate through the external environment. Vibrio cholerae spreads to humans from aquatic environments. Of particular interest to her team is sodium metabolism, which plays an important role in the adaptation of Vibrio cholerae to different conditions. Barquera’s group aims to understand the changes in patterns of gene expression responsible for this adaptation; a second focus is the mechanistic enzymology of sodium metabolism. The researchers are especially interested in Na+- NADH:quinone oxidoreductase (Na+-NQR), a unique respiratory enzyme that functions as a primary sodium pump.

Her team employs a wide variety of techniques, including genetic manipulation of the bacteria, biochemistry, spectroscopy, kinetics, and other biophysical methods, as well as assays of gene expression by means of DNA-arrays.

Selected Publications:
C.C. Häse and B. Barquera, “Role of Sodium Bionergetics in Vibrio cholerae,” Biochimica et Biophysica Acta, 1505, (1), 169-178, (2001).

B. Barquera, C.C. Häse, and R.B. Gennis, “Expression and Mutagenesis of the NqrC Subunit of the NQR respiratory Na+-pump from Vibrio cholerae with Covalently Attached FMN,” Federation of European Biochemical Societies (FEBS) Letters, 492, 45-49, (2001).

A.V. Bogachev, Y.V. Bertsova, B. Barquera, and M.I. Verkhovsky, “Sodium Dependent Steps in the Redox Reactions of the Na+-Motive NADH:Quinone Oxidoreductase from Vibrio harveyi,” Biochemistry, 40, (24), 7318-7323, (2001).

M.L. Verkhovskaya, B. Barquera, and M. Wikström, “Deletion of One of Two Escherichia coli Genes Encoding Putative Na+/H+ Exchangers (ycgO) Perturbs Cytoplasmic Alkali Cation Balance at Low Osmolarity, Microbiology, 147, 3005-3013, (2001).

B. Barquera, P. Hellwig, W. Zhou, J.E. Morgan, C.C. Häse, K.K. Gosink, M. Nilges, P.J. Bruesehoff, A. Roth, C.R.D. Lancaster, and R.B. Gennis, “Purification and Characterization of the Recombinant Na+-Translocating NADH:Quinone Oxidoreductase from Vibrio cholerae,” Biochemistry, 41, (11), 3781-3789, (2001).

B. Barquera, W. Zhou, J.E. Morgan, and R.B. Gennis, “Riboflavin is a Component of the Na+-Pumping NADH:Quinone Oxidoreductase from Vibrio cholerae,” Proceedings of the National Academy of Science, 99, 10322-10324, (2002).

B. Barquera, J.E. Morgan, D. Lukoyanov, C.P. Scholes, R.B. Gennis, and M.J. Nilges, “X- and W-Band EPR and Q-Band ENDOR Studies of the Flavin Radical in the Na+-Translocating NADH:Quinone Oxidoreductase from Vibrio cholerae,” Journal of American Chemical Society, 125, (1), 265-275, (2003).

B. Barquera, M.J. Nilges, J.E. Morgan, L. Ramirez-Silva, W. Zhou, and R.B. Gennis, “Mutagenesis Study of the 2Fe-2S Center and the FAD Binding Site of the Na+-Translocating NADH:Ubiquinone Oxidoreductase from Vibrio cholerae,” Biochemistry,” submitted.

Contact Information:
Blanca Barquera
No email or phone available yet.