Alain Scaiola
Structural biologist in Nenad Ban's group at ETH Zurich who solved the 3.2-angstrom cryo-EM structure of human mTORC2 and works on how ribosomes are built and how new proteins are processed
Institute of Molecular Biology and Biophysics, ETH Zurich (papers 2018–2026, Nenad Ban group)
Portrait: LinkedIn
Alain Scaiola is first author of the Atlas study SCA2020, a detailed three-dimensional picture of human mTORC2 at 3.2 angstrom resolution, sharp enough to place most individual amino acids. The structure was made by cryo-electron microscopy (cryo-EM), which freezes purified protein complexes in thin ice and combines hundreds of thousands of electron microscope images into one 3D map. mTORC2 is one of the two mTOR complexes and, unlike mTORC1, it is not blocked directly by rapamycin. The map shows why: the tail end of the protein Rictor covers the site on mTOR where the rapamycin-FKBP12 pair would bind.
Scaiola is also a co-author of STU2018, the earlier and lower-resolution architecture of the mTORC2 core (mTOR, Rictor, SIN1 and mLST8). Both papers came from a joint effort of the groups of Timm Maier at the University of Basel and Nenad Ban at ETH Zurich, and they give drug designers an accurate picture of the complex.
Scaiola's publication record from 2018 to 2026 is in Nenad Ban's group at the Institute of Molecular Biology and Biophysics of ETH Zurich. Most of the work is on the ribosome, the cell's protein-making machine: a 2018 first-author structure of a yeast ribosome subunit caught in the last steps of assembly, and later studies with the Deuerling lab in Konstanz on how the NAC complex guides enzymes that trim and tag new proteins as they leave the ribosome (Nature 2024; Nature Communications 2026). No personal web page was found, so the current job title is not confirmed.
Milestones in the Atlas
A selection, not a full bibliography: only papers that meet the Atlas inclusion criteria.
| Year | Evidence | Study |
|---|---|---|
| 2018 | M | Architecture of the human mTORC2 core complex STU2018 Co-author: contributed to the first architecture of the human mTORC2 core complex. |
| 2020 | M | The 3.2-Å resolution structure of human mTORC2. SCA2020 First author: determined the 3.2-angstrom cryo-EM structure of human mTORC2 and showed how Rictor's C-terminus blocks rapamycin binding. |
Co-authors in the Atlas 9
People with a profile here who share at least one study with Alain Scaiola.
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- Daniel Boehringer 2 shared studies Electron microscopy specialist at ETH Zurich whose cryo-EM work underpins the Atlas structures of human mTORC1 and mTORC2
- Edward Stuttfeld 2 shared studies Structural biologist who led the 2018 eLife study that gave the first detailed picture of the human mTORC2 core complex, working in Timm Maier's lab in Basel
- Michael N. Hall 2 shared studies Discovered TOR in yeast in 1991 and established it as a central controller of cell growth that responds to nutrients. His lab later showed that TOR works in two distinct complexes, TORC1 and TORC2, only one of which is blocked by rapamycin
- Nenad Ban 2 shared studies Structural biologist known for atomic structures of the ribosome and for work on how cells make, fold and sort proteins.
- Stefan Imseng 2 shared studies Structural biologist from Timm Maier's group at the Biozentrum Basel who helped solve the first detailed structures of human mTORC1 and mTORC2 and then worked on a drug to block mTORC1 specifically
- Timm Maier 2 shared studies Solved some of the first cryo-EM structures of human mTORC1 (with Nenad Ban's group) and mTORC2, including a high-resolution map of mTORC2
- Evelyn Sauer Structural biologist at the Biozentrum Basel who worked on the structure of the mTOR kinase and contributed to the cryo-EM structures of human mTORC1 and mTORC2
- Christopher Aylett Structural biologist who solved the first cryo-EM architecture of human mTORC1 at ETH Zurich and now leads a cryo-EM group at Imperial College London
- Mitsugu Shimobayashi Metabolism researcher who trained with Michael Hall in Basel on mTOR in fat tissue and now leads a group at KU Leuven studying how fat and liver control sugar and lipid storage
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