Danni Harris

Danni Harris, PhD, is a senior scientist at RTI who conducts computational chemistry and cheminformatics investigations facilitating rational drug design and predictive metabolism/toxicology. Dr. Harris has more than 20 years of experience in both applying and developing novel methods in structure- and ligand-based computational chemistry incorporating molecular, quantum, and statistical mechanics with an emphasis on target selectivity and minimization of off-target toxicity effects.

At RTI, he has focused on developing new lead compounds via ligand- and target-based virtual screening and leap-hop approaches (via 3D pharmacophore, fingerprint, and neural network analyses, multivariate statistical approaches), development of informatics approaches for the RTI molecular screening center, and database development for housing 50 years of synthetic/structural, bioanalytical, pharmacological, and toxicity data.

He is currently developing new computational approaches facilitating structure-based design, structure-activity relationships of large peptides, performing dynamics studies on G-protein-coupled receptor targets, and developing new potent/selective T-type Ca2+ ion-channel inhibitors as palliatives at a number of therapeutic endpoints.