1986 Doctor of Veterinary Medicine, Ukrainian Agricultural Academy, Kyiv, Ukraine. 
1991 Ph.D. in Biology, Institute for Experimental Pathology, Kyiv, Ukraine.


Research interests:

• Anti-apoptotic signaling network
• BAD as a therapeutic target
• Monitoring signaling pathways by optical imaging
• Targeted therapies that inhibit anti-apoptotic signaling pathways in prostate cancer models
• Emotional stress and prostate cancer

Honors and awards:

First Prize for Research Work, Conference of Young Scientists, Kiev, 1989
Best Poster, 4th International Conference on Hormones and Cancer, Amsterdam, 1991
EMBO Fellowship, 1993
IUCC Fellowship, 1995

Scientific review panel membership:

DOD Breast Cancer Research Program (2006-present)

Selected publications:

1. Adrienne J. Smith, Yelena Karpova, Ralph D’Agostino Jr, Mark Willingham, and George Kulik  (2009) Expression of the Bcl-2 protein BAD promotes prostate cancer growth. PLoS One. 2009 Jul 13;4(7):e622.

2. Isabelle M. Berquin, Younong Min, Ruping Wu, Jiansheng Wu, Donna Perry, J. Mark Cline, Mike J. Thomas, Todd Thornburg, George Kulik, Iris J. Edwards, Ralph D’Agostino Jr., Adrienne Smith, Hao Zhang, Hong Wu, Jing X. Kang and Yong Q. Chen. (2007) Modulation of Prostate Cancer Genetic Risk by Omega-3 and Omega-6 Fatty Acids. J Clin Invest. 117(7):1866-1875.

3. Sastry KS, Karpova Y, Prokopovich S, Smith AJ, Essau B, Gersappe A, Carson JP, Weber MJ, Register TC, Chen YQ, Penn RB, Kulik G. (2007) Epinephrine protects cancer cells from apoptosis via activation of PKA and BAD phosphorylation. J Biol. Chem. May 11;282(19):14094-100.

4. Konduru S. R. Sastry, Yelena Karpova, and George Kulik. (2006) Epidermal Growth Factor Protects Prostate Cancer Cells from Apoptosis by Inducing BAD Phosphorylation via Redundant Signaling Pathways. J Biol. Chem. 281(37):27367-77.

5. Konduru S. R. Sastry, Adrienne Joy Smith, Yelena Karpova, Sandeep Robert Datta, and George Kulik. (2006) Diverse anti-apoptotic signaling pathways activated by VIP, EGF and PI3K in prostate cancer cells converge on BAD. J Biol Chem. 281(30):20891-901.

6. Jonathan P. Carson, Marcelina Behnam, Jennifer Sutton, Chunying Du, Xiaodong Wang, Donald Hunt, Michael J. Weber and George Kulik. (2002) Smac is required for cytochrome c-induced apoptosis in prostate cancer LNCaP cells. Cancer Res. 62: 18-23.

7. George Kulik, Jonathan P. Carson, Tomas Vomastek, Kevin Overman, Barry D. Gooch, Srinivasa Srinivasula, Emad Alnemri, Gabriel Nunez and Michael J. Weber. (2001) TNF-a induces BID cleavage and bypasses antiapoptotic signals in prostate cancer LNCaP cells. Cancer Res. 61: 2713-2719.

8. Jonatan P. Carson, George Kulik and Michael J. Weber. (1999) Anti-apoptotic signaling in LNCaP prostate cancer cells: a survival signaling pathway independent of PI3 kinase and Akt/PKB. Cancer Res. 59: 1449-1453.

9. George Kulik and Michael J. Weber. (1998) Akt-dependent and independent survival signalling pathways utilized by IGF-I. Molecular and Cellular Biology, 18:6711-6718.

10. George Kulik, Anke Klippel, and Michael J. Weber. (1997) Antiapoptotic signalling by the Insulin-like growth factor receptor, Phosphatidylinositol 3-kinase, and Akt. Molecular and Cellular Biology, 17: 1595-1606.

11. John E.Peterson, George Kulik, Tomas Jelinek, Christoph W. M. Reuter, John A. Shannon, and Michael J. Weber. (1996) Src phosphorylates the Insulin-like growth factor receptor on the autophosphorylation sites. The Journal of Biological Chemistry 271: 31562-31571.