Dr Anton Le Brun
Phone: +61 (2) 9717 9921
Email: Anton.LEBRUN@ansto.gov.au
Anton Le Brun is a post-doctorial research fellow in the National Deuteration Facility. His research interests are in membrane structural biology with a particular focus for studying integral membrane proteins in lipid bilayers using neutron reflection. He completed his BSc in biochemistry at the University of York. After studying for an MRes in functional genomics also at the University of York, Anton went onto study for a PhD in biophysics in Professor Jeremy Lakeys laboratory at the University of Newcastle upon Tyne. His thesis describes characterising model membranes based on the outer membrane of the bacterial Gram-negative cell envelope. The membrane components were immobilised to gold surfaces and the structure studied using neutron reflection with solvent and magnetic contrasts. This lead to working with a small biotech company, Orla Protein Technologies Ltd, to characterise membrane proteins used for biosensor devices using techniques such as neutron reflection, SANS, circular dichroism spectroscopy and surface plasmon resonance. Before joining the Bragg Institute, Anton worked for Diamond Light Source where he was involved in the commissioning of a beamline for high-throughput X-ray protein crystallography.
Publications
Holt SA, Le Brun AP, Majkrzak CF, McGillivray DJ, Heinrich F, Lösche M, Lakey JH: An ion-channel-containing model membrane: structural determination by magnetic contrast neutron reflectometry. Soft Matter 2009, 5(13):2576-2586.
Le Brun AP, Holt SA, Shah DS, Majkrzak CF, Lakey JH: Monitoring the assembly of antibody-binding membrane protein arrays using polarised neutron refection. European Biophysics Journal 2008, 37(5):639-645.
Shah DS, Thomas MB, Philips S, Cisneros DA, Le Brun AP, Holt SA, Lakey JH: Self assembling layers created by membrane proteins on gold. Biochemical Society Transactions 2007, 35(3):522-526.