Ben Sellers
Senior Scientist (Cheminformatics), Discovery Chemistry & Computational Drug Discovery
"I am humbled every day by discoveries that increase our understanding of life and disease. I feel fortunate to work with others in developing these discoveries into medicines."
10
Years at Genentech
11
Publications
2
Awards & Honors
I joined the Computational Drug Discovery group at Genentech in 2009. My role involves developing computational tools and modeling of potential drugs as part of therapeutic project teams. My background is also a mix of software engineering and science; I developed computer-aided design software for several years at Autodesk, Inc. before diving into protein modeling in the Jacobson lab at UCSF. Genentech is a fantastic, collaborative environment that values risk-taking and basic science.
Featured Publication
A Comparison of Quantum and Molecular Mechanical Methods to Estimate Strain Energy in Druglike Fragments.
J Chem Inf Model. 2017 Jun 26;57(6):1265-1275.
Sellers BD, James NC, Gobbi A.
My Focus
I am primarily interested in the development and refinement of physics-based methods for predicting protein-ligand interactions. My work has included analysis of limitations in industry force fields relative to quantum calculations and development of methods for understanding pi-pi interactions. I have also combined fast, statistics-based methods with physics-based rescoring. Ongoing, I am interested in increasing industry use of molecular dynamics and free-energy calculations.
Publications
Journal of Medicinal Chemistry, ISSN: 15204804
Matthew Volgraf; Ben Sellers; Yu Jiang; Guosheng Wu; Cuong Ly; Elisia Villemure; Rich Pastor; Po-Wai Yuen; Aijun Lu; Xifeng Luo; Mingcui Liu; Shun Zhang; Liang Sun; Yuhong Fu; Patrick Lupardus; Heidi Ackerly Wallweber; Bianca Liederer; Gauri Deshmukh; Emile Plise; Suzanne Brown; Paul Reynen; James Herrington; Amy Gustafson; Yichin Liu; Akim Dirksen; Matthias G. A. Dietz; Yanzhou Liu; Tzu-Ming Wang; Jesse Hanson; David Hackos; Kimberly Scearce-Levie; Jacob Schwarz
Neuron, ISSN: 10974199
David Hackos; Patrick Lupardus; Teddy Grand; Yelin Chen; Tzu-Ming Wang; Paul Reynen; Amy Gustafson; Heidi Ackerly Wallweber; Matthew Volgraf; Ben Sellers; Jacob Schwarz; Pierre Paoletti; Morgan Sheng; Qiang Zhou; Jesse Hanson
Neuropharmacology, ISSN: 18737064
Tzu-Ming Wang; Brandon M. Brown; Lunbin Deng; Ben Sellers; Patrick Lupardus; Heidi Ackerly Wallweber; Amy Gustafson; Evera Wong; Matthew Volgraf; Jacob Schwarz; David Hackos; Jesse Hanson
Scientific Reports, ISSN: 20452322
Anton V. Sinitskiy; Nathaniel H. Stanley; David Hackos; Jesse Hanson; Ben Sellers; Vijay S. Pande
ACS Medicinal Chemistry Letters, ISSN: 19485875
Elisia Villemure; Matthew Volgraf; Yu Jiang; Guosheng Wu; Cuong Ly; Po-Wai Yuen; Aijun Lu; Xifeng Luo; Mingcui Liu; Shun Zhang; Patrick Lupardus; Heidi Ackerly Wallweber; Bianca Liederer; Gauri Deshmukh; Emile Plise; Suzanne Brown; Tzu-Ming Wang; Jesse Hanson; David Hackos; Kimberly Scearce-Levie; Jacob Schwarz; Ben Sellers
Journal of Cheminformatics, ISSN: 17582946
Man Ling Lee; Ignacio Aliagas; Jianwen A. Feng; Thomas Gabriel; O'Donnell; Ben Sellers; Bernd Wiswedel; Alberto Gobbi
A Comparison of Quantum and Molecular Mechanical Methods to Estimate Strain Energy in Druglike Fragments
Journal of Chemical Information and Modeling, ISSN: 15499596
Ben Sellers; Natalie C. James; Alberto Gobbi
ACS Medicinal Chemistry Letters, ISSN: 19485875
Zhonghua Pei; Rohan Mendonca; Lewis Gazzard; Rich Pastor; Leanne Goon; Amy Gustafson; Erica VanderPorten; Georgia Hatzivassiliou; Kevin DeMent; Robert T. Cass; Po-Wai Yuen; Yamin Zhang; Guosheng Wu; Xingyu Lin; Yichin Liu; Ben Sellers
Nature, ISSN: 14764687 00280836
Hoangdung Ho; Anh Miu; Mary Kate Alexander; Natalie K. Garcia; Angela Oh; Inna Zilberleyb; Mike Reichelt; Cary Austin; Christine Tam; Stephanie Shriver; Huiyong Hu; Sharada Labadie; Jun Liang; Lan Wang; Jian Wang; Yan Lu; Hans Purkey; John Quinn; Yvonne Franke; Kevin Clark; Maureen Beresini; Man Wah Tan; Ben Sellers; Till Maurer; Michael F. T. Koehler; Aaron Wecksler; James Kiefer; Vishal Verma; Yiming Xu; Mireille Nishiyama; Jian Payandeh; Chris Koth
Disrupting Gram-negative bacterial outer membrane biosynthesis through inhibition of the lipopolysaccharide transporter MsbA
Antimicrobial Agents and Chemotherapy, ISSN: 00664804
Mary Kate Alexander; Anh Miu; Angela Oh; Mike Reichelt; Hoangdung Ho; Cecile Chalouni; Sharada Labadie; Lan Wang; Jun Liang; Nicholas N. Nickerson; Huiyong Hu; Lan Yu; Miaofen Du; Donghong Yan; Summer Park; Janice Kim; Min Xu; Ben Sellers; Hans Purkey; Nicholas J. Skelton; Michael F. T. Koehler; Jian Payandeh; Vishal Verma; Yiming Xu; Chris Koth; Mireille Nishiyama
Journal of Medicinal Chemistry, ISSN: 15204804 00222623
Shaoyi Sun; Qi Jia; Alla Zenova; Michael S. Wilson; Sultan Chowdhury; Thilo Focken; Jun Li; Shannon M. Decker; Michael Grimwood; Jean-Christophe Andrez; Ivan Hemeon; Tao Sheng; Chien-An Chen; Andrew D. White; David Hackos; Lunbin Deng; Girish Bankar; Kuldip Khakh; Elaine Chang; Rainbow Kwan; Sophia Lin; Karen Nelkenbrecher; Ben Sellers; Antonio DiPasquale; Jae H. Chang; Jodie Pang; Luis E. Sojo; Andrea Lindgren; Matthew Waldbrook; Zhiwei Xie; Clint Young; James P. Johnson; C. Lee Robinette; Charles J. Cohen; Brian Safina; Dan Sutherlin; Dan Ortwine; Christoph Dehnhardt
Education
- University of California, San Francisco, Ph.D. in Biophysics & Quantitative Biology – 2008
- Cornell University, B.S. in Applied and Engineering Physics – 1993
Awards & Honors
- Genentech Scholar Graduate Fellowship – 2004
- NSF Graduate Research Fellowship Honorable Mention – 2003
