Howe | Biomedical and Molecular Sciences | School of Medicine

Graeme Howe PhD, University of Toronto, 2016

Position(s)

Associate Professor, Chemistry; DBMS

Contact Info

Chernoff Hall, Rm 512

Graeme Howe received his Hon. B.Sc. in Chemistry from the University of Toronto. During his undergraduate studies, he had the opportunity to work with Prof. Dwight Seferos, learning to use computation to predict the properties and reactivities of small molecules. Graeme remained in Toronto to carry out his doctoral studies with Prof. Ron Kluger, studying the mechanisms of decarboxylation of thiamin-derived intermediates and aromatic acids. After receiving his doctorate in 2016, Graeme traveled south of the border to use physical organic chemistry to the study the mechanisms of unusual phosphotransferases under the supervision of Prof. Wilfred van der Donk at UIUC. Graeme began his independent career in the Department of Chemistry at Queen’s University in July of 2019, where he combines his experience with physical organic chemistry, mechanistic enzymology, and bioinformatics to find new biocatalysts with the potential to transform chemical industries into sustainable ventures.

The Howe Lab Website

Education

PhD, University of Toronto, 2016
NSERC Postdoctoral Fellow, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 2016 – 2019

Research Interests

Genome mining for novel extremozymes
Characterizing the evolutionary trajectories of increasingly efficient enzymes
Directed evolution to engineer enzymes with expanded utilities

Selected Publications

Full list of publications can be found here

Grenade, N. L.; Feng, Y.; Perrino, E. H.; Ross, A. C.*; Howe, G. W.* Characterization of a novel fatty acid-modifying pathway in the biosynthesis of tambjamine BE-18591 in Streptomyces. Accepted. J. Nat. Prod. Manuscript ID: np-2025-00989m.R2.
Hu, Z.; Klupt, K.; Zechel, D. L.; Jia, Z.; Howe, G. W.* Mining Thermophile Genomes for New PETases with Exceptional Thermostabilities using Sequence Similarity Networks. ChemBioChem 2025, 26, e202500065.
Hoffman, E. R.; Rangaswamy, A. M. M.; Cleveland, M. E.; Keillor, J. W.; Howe, G. W.* Targeted Genome Mining Facilitates the Discovery of a Promiscuous, Hyperthermostable Amidase from Thermovenabulum gondwanense with Notable Nylon-Degrading Capacity. Angew. Chem. Int. Ed. 2024, 64, e202414842.
Grenade, N. L.; Howe, G. W.* Intramolecular Cyclization and a Retro-Ene Reaction Enable the Rapid Fragmentation of a Vitamin B1-derived Breslow Intermediate. Chem. Eur. J. 2024, 30, e202401106.
Bunyat-zada, A. R.‡; Ducharme, S. E.‡; Cleveland, M. E.; Hoffman, E. R.; Howe, G. W.* Genome mining leads to the identification of a stable and promiscuous Baeyer-Villiger monooxygenase from a thermophilic microorganism. ChemBioChem 2024, 25, e202400443.

Faculty

Team

Education

Research Interests

Selected Publications

Faculty