The Doc.Award acknowledges her outstanding PhD thesis entitled “Role of membrane binding in the activation of Protein Kinase B (PKB) and Protein Kinase C (PKC)”. Only eight dissertations are chosen out of all dissertations from the University of Vienna in the past year. The prize is sponsored by the City of Vienna and aims to foster excellent young talents and encourage them to continue pursuing an academic career. This year, the Doc.Awards received the largest number of applicants to date.

During her PhD, Iva studied two kinases involved in cell growth, proliferation and cellular metabolism: Protein Kinase B (PKB, also called Akt) and Protein Kinase C (PKC). Significantly, Iva was able to demonstrate the allosteric activation of Akt by two specific phospholipids, thereby overturning the prevailing model of signal transduction by Akt in cells. Iva’s PhD work has been published in the Journal of Molecular Biology and Molecular Cell. In February 2018, Iva began per postdoctoral work at the Forschungsinstitut für Molekulare Pharmakologie (FMP) in Berlin.

For an up-to-date list of prizes at the University of Vienna, have a look at their funding website.