Robert J Tomko Jr. Ph.D.
Associate Professor
Biosketch
Tomko Lab Webpage
Dr. Tomko completed his graduate studies in pharmacology at the University Of Pittsburgh School Of Medicine’s Drug Discovery Institute, where he became familiar with modern drug discovery and development. His thesis work probing the regulation of a short-lived protein sparked his interest in the cell’s machinery to recycle damaged or unneeded proteins. To pursue this interest, he moved to Yale University, where he was an American Cancer Society Postdoctoral Fellow in the Department of Molecular Biophysics and Biochemistry. As a postdoctoral fellow, Robert made several seminal discoveries regarding the assembly of the proteasome, a large, multisubunit protease complex that executes most of the cell’s regulatory and quality control protein degradation. In 2015, Dr. Tomko joined the faculty of Biomedical Sciences at FSU, where his group studies the structure and function of ubiquitin-proteasome system components in normal and disease states. His laboratory works on the scale of individual proteins up to whole cells, and integrates approaches spanning biochemistry, cell biology, genetics, structural biology, proteomics, biophysics, and pharmacology. Ultimately, his group aims to utilize the information gained from these basic studies of the ubiquitin-proteasome system to identify new targets and develop pharmacological modulators with potential thereapeutic benefit.
Education
American Cancer Society Postdoctoral Fellow, Yale University, Department of Molecular Biophysics and Biochemistry
Ph.D., Pharmacology and Chemical Biology, University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine and Drug Discovery Institute
B.S., Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, Lebanon Valley College
Service
2023 - Present Senator, Florida State University Senate
2022 - Present Editorial Board Member, the Journal of Biological Chemistry
2022 - Present Grants reviewer, US-Israel Binational Science Foundation
2022 - Present Reviewingi member, Florida Agricultural & Mechanical University Institutional Biosafety Committee
2021 - 2022 Member, Faculty Recruitment Committee, Department of Biomedical Sciences
2019 - Present Scientific advisor, Wetware development, FSU iGEM Program
2019 - Present Member, FSU-COM Physician Assistant Program Student Progress Committee
2019 Session chair, Protein Interactions, Modifications, and Regulation Section, Experimental Biology 2019 Meeting
2019 MBPP study section member, ad hoc
2019 - Present Invited grants reviewer, Israel Science Foundation
2017 - Present Member, Graduate Policy Committee, Department of Biomedical Sciences
2016 - 2019 Florida State University College of Medicine Research Advisory Committee
2016 - 2018 Dept. of Biomedical Sciences Promotion and Tenure Committee
2015 - Present Dept. of Biomedical Sciences Faculty Search Committee
2015 - Present Dept. of Biomedical Sciences Postdoctoral Career and Mentoring Committee
Honors/Awards
2021 Florida State University Undergraduate Faculty Research Mentor Award
2019 Florida State University Graduate Teaching Award
2018 Florida State University College of Medicine Outstanding Junior Faculty Researcher Award
2018 Florida State University College of Medicine Outstanding Junior Faculty Educator Award
2015 First-Year Assistant Professor Award
2014 Finalist, Earl Stadtman Symposium on Molecular Biology and Biochemistry NIH, Bethesda MD
2013 Nominee, Blavatnik Award for Young Scientists
2010 - 2013 American Cancer Society Postdoctoral Fellowship
2009 - 2010 James Hudson Brown – Alexander B. Coxe Postdoctoral Fellowship in the Medical Sciences
2007 University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine Most Well-Rounded Graduate Student Award
2002 American Chemical Society Outstanding Chemistry Major Award
2002 Southeastern PA Section American Chemical Society Award
2001 American Chemical Society Award for Outstanding Performance in Organic Chemistry
Memberships
2015 - Present, American Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology
2006 - Present, American Association for Cancer Research
2005 - Present, American Society for Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics
Courses
Medical program
BMS-6037 Foundations of Medicine II: Molecules to Mechanisms (Small group activity leader)
BMS-6041 Host Defense (Instructor)
Physician assistant program
PAS-5071 Clinical Pharmacology I (Founding course director; instructor)
PAS-5072 Clinical Pharmacology II (Founding course director; instructor)
Biomedical Sciences Ph.D. program
BMS-5525 Bioregulation (Instructor)
GMS-6003 Professional Development (Instructor)
Research Focus
Regulation of proteasome assembly and function in health and infectious disease; multidisciplinary analyses of biomedically important molecular machines; proteases and proteolysis
Publications
Dr. Tomko's full list of publications can be found HERE.
Selected publications from the Tomko lab (student authors are underlined):
Nemec, A.A. and Tomko, R. J. Jr. An unstructured proteasome inhibitor comes into focus. J. Biol. Chem. 299: 105145, 2023. PMID: 37562568.
Warnock, J. L., Jobin, G. W., Kumar, S., and Tomko, R. J. Jr. Assembly chaperone Nas6 selectively destabilizes 26S proteasomes with defective regulatory particle – core particle interfaces. J Biol. Chem. 299: 102894, 2023. PMID: 36634850.
Editor’s Pick (Featured Article)
Huntsman, E. M., Cho, R., Kogan, H. V., McNamara-Bordewick, N. K., Tomko, R. J. Jr., and Snow, J. W. Proteasome inhibition is an effective treatment strategy for microsporidia infection in honey bees. Biomolecules. 11:1600, 202 PMID: 34827599.
Rossetti, M., Tomko, R. J. Jr., and Gordon, B. Androgen depletion alters the diurnal patterns to signals that regulate autophagy in the limb skeletal muscle. Mol. Cell. Biochem. 476: 959-69, 2021. PMID: 33128669.
Beesley, S., Kim, D., D'Alessandro, M., Jin, Y., Lee, K., Joo, H., Young, Y., Tomko, R. J. Jr., Kim, J. K., and Lee, C. Robustness of the circadian rhythm requires precise trafficking of the pacemaker PER protein. Proc. Nat. Acad. Sci. USA. 117: 28402-11, 2020. PMID: 33106420.
Higgins, R., Kabbaj, M-H., Sherwin, D., Howell, L.A., Hatcher, A., Tomko, R. J. Jr., and Wang, Y. The Cdc48 complex alleviates the cytotoxicity of misfolded proteins by regulating ubiquitin homeostasis. Cell Rep. 32: 107898, 2020. PMID: 32668237.
Howell, L. A., Peterson, A. K., and Tomko, R. J. Jr. Proteasome subunit alpha1 overexpression preferentially drives canonical proteasome biogenesis and enhances stress tolerance in yeast. Scientific Reports. 9: 12418, 2019. PMID: 31455793.
Nemec, A. A., Peterson A. K., Warnock, J. L., Reed, R. G., and Tomko, R. J. Jr. An Allosteric Interaction Network Promotes Conformation State-Dependent Eviction of the Nas6 Assembly Chaperone from Nascent 26S Proteasomes. Cell Reports. 26: 483-495, 2019. PMID: 30625330.
Eisele, M.†, Reed, R. G.†, Rudack, T.†, Schweitzer, A., Beck, F., Nagy, I., Pfeifer, G., Plitzko, J., Baumeister, W.,* Tomko, R. J. Jr.,*# and Sakata, E.* Expanded coverage of the 26S proteasome conformational landscape reveals mechanisms of peptidase gating. Cell Reports. 24: 1301-1315, 2018. PMID: 30067984.
†Equal contributions
*Corresponding author
#Lead contact
Featured in Trends in Biochemical Sciences 2018; 18: 30150-6.
Nemec, A. A.,* Howell, L. A.,* Peterson, A. K., Murray, M. A., and Tomko, R. J. Jr. Autophagic clearance of proteasomes in yeast requires the conserved sorting nexin Snx4. Journal of Biological Chemistry. 292: 21466-21480, 2017. PMID: 29109144.
*Equal contributions
Tomko, Jr., R.J.,* Taylor, D.W., Chen, Z.A., Wang, H.W., Rappsilber, J., and Hochstrasser, M. A Single Alpha Helix Drives Largescale Remodeling of the Proteasome Lid and Completion of Regulatory Particle Assembly. Cell. 163: 432-444, 2015.
*Corresponding Author
Tomko Lab Webpage
Dr. Tomko completed his graduate studies in pharmacology at the University Of Pittsburgh School Of Medicine’s Drug Discovery Institute, where he became familiar with modern drug discovery and development. His thesis work probing the regulation of a short-lived protein sparked his interest in the cell’s machinery to recycle damaged or unneeded proteins. To pursue this interest, he moved to Yale University, where he was an American Cancer Society Postdoctoral Fellow in the Department of Molecular Biophysics and Biochemistry. As a postdoctoral fellow, Robert made several seminal discoveries regarding the assembly of the proteasome, a large, multisubunit protease complex that executes most of the cell’s regulatory and quality control protein degradation. In 2015, Dr. Tomko joined the faculty of Biomedical Sciences at FSU, where his group studies the structure and function of ubiquitin-proteasome system components in normal and disease states. His laboratory works on the scale of individual proteins up to whole cells, and integrates approaches spanning biochemistry, cell biology, genetics, structural biology, proteomics, biophysics, and pharmacology. Ultimately, his group aims to utilize the information gained from these basic studies of the ubiquitin-proteasome system to identify new targets and develop pharmacological modulators with potential thereapeutic benefit.
American Cancer Society Postdoctoral Fellow, Yale University, Department of Molecular Biophysics and Biochemistry
Ph.D., Pharmacology and Chemical Biology, University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine and Drug Discovery Institute
B.S., Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, Lebanon Valley College
2023 - Present Senator, Florida State University Senate
2022 - Present Editorial Board Member, the Journal of Biological Chemistry
2022 - Present Grants reviewer, US-Israel Binational Science Foundation
2022 - Present Reviewingi member, Florida Agricultural & Mechanical University Institutional Biosafety Committee
2021 - 2022 Member, Faculty Recruitment Committee, Department of Biomedical Sciences
2019 - Present Scientific advisor, Wetware development, FSU iGEM Program
2019 - Present Member, FSU-COM Physician Assistant Program Student Progress Committee
2019 Session chair, Protein Interactions, Modifications, and Regulation Section, Experimental Biology 2019 Meeting
2019 MBPP study section member, ad hoc
2019 - Present Invited grants reviewer, Israel Science Foundation
2017 - Present Member, Graduate Policy Committee, Department of Biomedical Sciences
2016 - 2019 Florida State University College of Medicine Research Advisory Committee
2016 - 2018 Dept. of Biomedical Sciences Promotion and Tenure Committee
2015 - Present Dept. of Biomedical Sciences Faculty Search Committee
2015 - Present Dept. of Biomedical Sciences Postdoctoral Career and Mentoring Committee
2021 Florida State University Undergraduate Faculty Research Mentor Award
2019 Florida State University Graduate Teaching Award
2018 Florida State University College of Medicine Outstanding Junior Faculty Researcher Award
2018 Florida State University College of Medicine Outstanding Junior Faculty Educator Award
2015 First-Year Assistant Professor Award
2014 Finalist, Earl Stadtman Symposium on Molecular Biology and Biochemistry NIH, Bethesda MD
2013 Nominee, Blavatnik Award for Young Scientists
2010 - 2013 American Cancer Society Postdoctoral Fellowship
2009 - 2010 James Hudson Brown – Alexander B. Coxe Postdoctoral Fellowship in the Medical Sciences
2007 University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine Most Well-Rounded Graduate Student Award
2002 American Chemical Society Outstanding Chemistry Major Award
2002 Southeastern PA Section American Chemical Society Award
2001 American Chemical Society Award for Outstanding Performance in Organic Chemistry
2015 - Present, American Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology
2006 - Present, American Association for Cancer Research
2005 - Present, American Society for Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics
Medical program
BMS-6037 Foundations of Medicine II: Molecules to Mechanisms (Small group activity leader)
BMS-6041 Host Defense (Instructor)
Physician assistant program
PAS-5071 Clinical Pharmacology I (Founding course director; instructor)
PAS-5072 Clinical Pharmacology II (Founding course director; instructor)
Biomedical Sciences Ph.D. program
BMS-5525 Bioregulation (Instructor)
GMS-6003 Professional Development (Instructor)
Regulation of proteasome assembly and function in health and infectious disease; multidisciplinary analyses of biomedically important molecular machines; proteases and proteolysis
Dr. Tomko's full list of publications can be found HERE.
Selected publications from the Tomko lab (student authors are underlined):
Nemec, A.A. and Tomko, R. J. Jr. An unstructured proteasome inhibitor comes into focus. J. Biol. Chem. 299: 105145, 2023. PMID: 37562568.
Warnock, J. L., Jobin, G. W., Kumar, S., and Tomko, R. J. Jr. Assembly chaperone Nas6 selectively destabilizes 26S proteasomes with defective regulatory particle – core particle interfaces. J Biol. Chem. 299: 102894, 2023. PMID: 36634850.
Editor’s Pick (Featured Article)
Huntsman, E. M., Cho, R., Kogan, H. V., McNamara-Bordewick, N. K., Tomko, R. J. Jr., and Snow, J. W. Proteasome inhibition is an effective treatment strategy for microsporidia infection in honey bees. Biomolecules. 11:1600, 202 PMID: 34827599.
Rossetti, M., Tomko, R. J. Jr., and Gordon, B. Androgen depletion alters the diurnal patterns to signals that regulate autophagy in the limb skeletal muscle. Mol. Cell. Biochem. 476: 959-69, 2021. PMID: 33128669.
Beesley, S., Kim, D., D'Alessandro, M., Jin, Y., Lee, K., Joo, H., Young, Y., Tomko, R. J. Jr., Kim, J. K., and Lee, C. Robustness of the circadian rhythm requires precise trafficking of the pacemaker PER protein. Proc. Nat. Acad. Sci. USA. 117: 28402-11, 2020. PMID: 33106420.
Higgins, R., Kabbaj, M-H., Sherwin, D., Howell, L.A., Hatcher, A., Tomko, R. J. Jr., and Wang, Y. The Cdc48 complex alleviates the cytotoxicity of misfolded proteins by regulating ubiquitin homeostasis. Cell Rep. 32: 107898, 2020. PMID: 32668237.
Howell, L. A., Peterson, A. K., and Tomko, R. J. Jr. Proteasome subunit alpha1 overexpression preferentially drives canonical proteasome biogenesis and enhances stress tolerance in yeast. Scientific Reports. 9: 12418, 2019. PMID: 31455793.
Nemec, A. A., Peterson A. K., Warnock, J. L., Reed, R. G., and Tomko, R. J. Jr. An Allosteric Interaction Network Promotes Conformation State-Dependent Eviction of the Nas6 Assembly Chaperone from Nascent 26S Proteasomes. Cell Reports. 26: 483-495, 2019. PMID: 30625330.
Eisele, M.†, Reed, R. G.†, Rudack, T.†, Schweitzer, A., Beck, F., Nagy, I., Pfeifer, G., Plitzko, J., Baumeister, W.,* Tomko, R. J. Jr.,*# and Sakata, E.* Expanded coverage of the 26S proteasome conformational landscape reveals mechanisms of peptidase gating. Cell Reports. 24: 1301-1315, 2018. PMID: 30067984.
†Equal contributions
*Corresponding author
#Lead contact
Featured in Trends in Biochemical Sciences 2018; 18: 30150-6.
Nemec, A. A.,* Howell, L. A.,* Peterson, A. K., Murray, M. A., and Tomko, R. J. Jr. Autophagic clearance of proteasomes in yeast requires the conserved sorting nexin Snx4. Journal of Biological Chemistry. 292: 21466-21480, 2017. PMID: 29109144.
*Equal contributions
Tomko, Jr., R.J.,* Taylor, D.W., Chen, Z.A., Wang, H.W., Rappsilber, J., and Hochstrasser, M. A Single Alpha Helix Drives Largescale Remodeling of the Proteasome Lid and Completion of Regulatory Particle Assembly. Cell. 163: 432-444, 2015.
*Corresponding Author