Sergey Budko, PhD, is a Research Assistant Professor of Medicine in the Division of Nephrology and Hypertension within the Department of Medicine at Vanderbilt University Medical Center.
His research interests involve the structural and functional organization of extracellular matrix (ECM), collagen models for normal and pathological processes, the biology and structure of rare collagen types, tissue/cell targeted therapy and diagnostics using collagen mimetics and combinatorial proteins, and ECM-based protein engineering of bioactive scaffolds.
Dr. Budko is addressing fundamental questions in the mechanisms of collagen folding and has found structural evidence for the co-existence of two triple-helical geometries within the natural sequence of collagen. He is also working to develop unique tools to study structure, folding, and function of collagen.