Contact information
Research groups
Lizbé Koekemoer
Protein Crystallography SRF Coordinator
Born and bred in South Africa, I completed my tertiary education at Stellenbosch university in Organic chemistry and Biochemistry. After completing my Masters I did a stint in the FMCG industry before returning to Stellenbosch for a PhD under the supervision of Prof Erick Strauss on all things CoA biosynthesis related in pathogenic bacteria. This was followed by a Postdoc at the university of Cape town based H3D, Africa’s first integrated drug discovery and development centre founded by Kelly Chibale, in Tuberculosis assay development. During my time at UCT I was fortunate enough be a visiting scientist in Chris Dowson’s laboratory at university of Warwick and I became interested in the application of crystallography and biophysical techniques fin early-stage drug discovery. In 2019 I joined the Structural Genomics Consortium (SGC) Oxford with Frank von Delft and Tobias Krojer to learn SBDD.
I am a Team leader and protein crystallography small research facility (PX-SRF) coordinator at the Centre for Medicines Discovery (CMD) at University of Oxford.
Key publications
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Open Science Discovery of Potent Non-Covalent SARS-CoV-2 Main Protease Inhibitors
Journal article
Boby ML. et al, (2020)
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A selection of Golden Gate vectors to simplify recombinant protein production inEscherichia coli
Preprint
Fairhead M. et al, (2024)
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Spiropyrimidinetrione DNA Gyrase Inhibitors with Potent and Selective Antituberculosis Activity.
Journal article
Govender P. et al, (2022), J Med Chem
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The low-cost Shifter microscope stage transforms the speed and robustness of protein crystal harvesting.
Journal article
Wright ND. et al, (2021), Acta Crystallogr D Struct Biol, 77, 62 - 74
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The Coenzyme A Level Modulator Hopantenate (HoPan) Inhibits Phosphopantotenoylcysteine Synthetase Activity.
Journal article
Mostert KJ. et al, (2021), ACS Chem Biol
Recent publications
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Crystallographic fragment screening and deep mutational scanning of Zika virus NS2B-NS3 protease enable development of resistance-resilient inhibitors.
Journal article
von Delft F. et al, (2025), Res Sq
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Crystallographic fragment screening and deep mutational scanning of Zika virus NS2B-NS3 protease enable development of resistance-resilient inhibitors.
Preprint
Ni X. et al, (2025)
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Binding-Site Purification of Actives (B-SPA) Enables Efficient Large-Scale Progression of Fragment Hits by Combining Multi-Step Array Synthesis With HT Crystallography.
Journal article
Grosjean H. et al, (2025), Angew Chem Int Ed Engl
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Heterologous production, purification and crystallization of 24C-sterol methyltransferase fromCandida albicans
Preprint
Mpontshane NS. et al, (2025)
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Dengue 2 NS2B-NS3 protease binding assay for compound screen using grating-coupled interferometry v1
Preprint
Capkin E. et al, (2025)