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About

Our work is focused on understanding how proteins within cells interact, and how genetic mutations that perturb these interactions can cause disease.

We are particularly interested in interactions between proteins involved in cell signalling. The network of signalling proteins within cells can be likened to an electronic circuit. Our research is identifying the missing components in these ‘circuits’ and explaining how diseases are caused by defects in the circuit components.

By understanding how defective signalling causes disease, we aim to develop drugs to control the actions of defective components. In particular we are seeking to understand how signalling defects can lead to a range of diseases, including ischemia-reperfusion injuries, such as stroke and kidney injury, inflammatory bowel disease, muscular dystrophy and cancers.

Publications

Selected publications from Prof James Murphy

Horne CR, Dite TA, Young SN, Mather LJ, Dagley LF, Johnson JL, Yaron-Barir TM, Huntsman EM, Daly LA, Byrne DP, Cadell AL, Ng BH, Yousef J, Multari DH, Shen L, McAloon LM, Manning G, Febbraio MA, Means AR, Cantley LC, Tanzer MC, Croucher DR, Eyers CE, Eyers PA, Scott JW, Murphy JM. PSKH1 kinase activity is differentially modulated via allosteric binding of Ca2+ sensor proteins. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America. 2025;122(8):10.1073/pnas.2420961122

Hoblos H, Cawthorne W, Samson AL, Murphy JM. Protein shapeshifting in necroptotic cell death signaling. Trends in Biochemical Sciences. 2025;50(2):10.1016/j.tibs.2024.11.006

Pefanis A, Bongoni AK, McRae JL, Salvaris EJ, Fisicaro N, Murphy JM, Ierino FL, Cowan PJ. Inhibition of RIPK1 or RIPK3 kinase activity post ischemia-reperfusion reduces the development of chronic kidney injury. Biochemical Journal. 2025;482(2):10.1042/bcj20240569

Tye H, Conos SA, Djajawi TM, Gottschalk TA, Abdoulkader N, Kong IY, Kammoun HL, Narayana VK, Kratina T, Speir M, Emery J, Simpson DS, Hall C, Vince AJ, Russo S, Crawley R, Rashidi M, Hildebrand JM, Murphy JM, Whitehead L, De Souza DP, Masters SL, Samson AL, Lalaoui N, Hawkins ED, Murphy AJ, Vince JE, Lawlor KE. Divergent roles of RIPK3 and MLKL in high-fat diet–induced obesity and MAFLD in mice. Life Science Alliance. 2025;8(1):10.26508/lsa.202302446

Chiou S, Cawthorne W, Soerianto T, Hofferek V, Patel KM, Garnish SE, Tovey Crutchfield EC, Hall C, Hildebrand JM, McConville MJ, Lawlor KE, Hawkins ED, Samson AL, Murphy JM. MLKL deficiency elevates testosterone production in male mice independently of necroptotic functions. Cell Death & Disease. 2024;15(11):10.1038/s41419-024-07242-z

Cater RJ, Ryan RM, Oakhill JS, Czabotar P, Murphy JM, Call MJ. Structure, function, surf, repeat: A week at Lorne Proteins 2024. Structure. 2024;32(11):10.1016/j.str.2024.10.007

Maddirevula S, Shagrani M, Ji A-R, Horne CR, Young SN, Mather LJ, Alqahtani M, McKerlie C, Wood G, Potter PK, Abdulwahab F, AlSheddi T, van der Woerd WL, van Gassen KLI, AlBogami D, Kumar K, Muhammad Akhtar AS, Binomar H, Almanea H, Faqeih E, Fuchs SA, Scott JW, Murphy JM, Alkuraya FS. Large-scale genomic investigation of pediatric cholestasis reveals a novel hepatorenal ciliopathy caused by PSKH1 mutations. Genetics in Medicine. 2024;26(11):10.1016/j.gim.2024.101231

Davies KA, Czabotar PE, Murphy JM. Death at a funeral: Activation of the dead enzyme, MLKL, to kill cells by necroptosis. Current Opinion in Structural Biology. 2024;88:10.1016/j.sbi.2024.102891

Garnish SE, Horne CR, Meng Y, Young SN, Jacobsen AV, Hildebrand JM, Murphy JM. Inhibitors identify an auxiliary role for mTOR signalling in necroptosis execution downstream of MLKL activation. Biochemical Journal. 2024;481(17):10.1042/bcj20240255

Diplock N, Baudin M, Xiang X, Liang L-Y, Dai W, Murphy JM, Lucet IS, Hassan JA, Lewis JD. Molecular dissection of the pseudokinase ZED1 expands effector recognition to the tomato immune receptor ZAR1. Plant Physiology. 2024;196(1):10.1093/plphys/kiae268

Lab research projects

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