{"podcast":{"title":"The Academic Minute","slug":"the-academic-minute-1102038","podcast_index_feed_id":1102038,"rss_url":"https://api.substack.com/feed/podcast/7972926.rss","website_url":"https://www.academicminute.org/podcast","image_url":"https://substackcdn.com/feed/podcast/7972926/3de65ac4cfe10a333128ea1e717f3fde.jpg","author":"Academic Minute","episode_count":1000,"summary":"Astronomy to Zoology","last_synced_at":"2026-07-30T14:17:21.893800+00:00","page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/the-academic-minute-1102038"},"episode":{"title":"Tom Grant, University at Buffalo - Predicting Protein Movements to Speed Up Drug Discovery","slug":"tom-grant-university-at-buffalo-predicting-protein-movements-to-speed-up-drug-discovery","published_at":"2026-06-19T04:01:00+00:00","page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/the-academic-minute-1102038/tom-grant-university-at-buffalo-predicting-protein-movements-to-speed-up-drug-discovery","show_page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/the-academic-minute-1102038","url":"https://www.academicminute.org/p/tom-grant-university-at-buffalo-predicting","audio_url":"https://api.substack.com/feed/podcast/201778569/ed70a4bf93e38e5eff5b370615ce7105.mp3","summary":"On University at Buffalo Week: Speeding up drug discovery will have many benefits. Tom Grant , assistant professor in the Department of Structural Biology in the Jacobs School of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences, looks into doing so. Faculty Bio: Thomas Grant is a structural biologist whose research focuses on developing innovative analytical methods to uncover the structure and dynamics of biological macromolecules. Trained at the University at Buffalo, where he earned a BS in Mathematical Physics (2007) and a PhD in Structural and Computational Biology (2013), Grant’s research combines rigorous quantitative training with experimental expertise in X-ray crystallography, small-angle scattering, and X-ray free electron laser methodologies. His work integrates advanced computational algorithm development with cutting-edge experimental tools to generate high-resolution structural models and time-resolved “molecular movies,” illuminating how proteins and nucleic acids function within the cell and informing rational drug design. In 2025, he was awarded a $2.18 million grant from the National Institute of General Medical Sciences, part of the National Institutes of Health, to create a new artificial intelligence-powered tool that improves scientists’ understanding of how proteins move and change shape within the human body. Transcript: In the United States, it often takes 10 to 15 years to develop a new drug from its initial discovery to market approval. In my lab, we’re working on an artificial intelligence-driven project called SWAXSFold that we hope will dramatically speed up this process. So let me explain what SWAXSFold is. A few years ago, Google DeepMind released an algorithm called AlphaFold. It has had a major impact in biomedical research, winning the 2024 Nobel Pr…","meta_description":"On University at Buffalo Week: Speeding up drug discovery will have many benefits. Tom Grant , assistant professor in the Department of Structural Biology…","key_points":[],"chapters":[],"topics":[],"duration_seconds":150,"processing_state":"not_requested","actions":[{"name":"request_transcript","method":"POST","url":"https://stenobird.com/v1/public/podcasts/the-academic-minute-1102038/episodes/tom-grant-university-at-buffalo-predicting-protein-movements-to-speed-up-drug-discovery/transcription-requests","description":"Idempotently request low-priority transcript generation for this episode."},{"name":"read_markdown","method":"GET","url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/the-academic-minute-1102038/tom-grant-university-at-buffalo-predicting-protein-movements-to-speed-up-drug-discovery.md","description":"Read the agent-friendly Markdown representation of this episode resource."}]}}