The Programmable Biology Group

We are developing peptide-guided protein therapeutics to target disordered and "undruggable" proteins. To accomplish this goal, we train generative language models, such as Cut&CLIP, SaLT&PepPr, PepPrCLIP, and PepMLM, to de novo design "guide" peptide binders to any pathogenic protein without needing its structure, and subsequently link these binders to post-translational modification domains to edit the protein. Our current peptide-E3 ubiquitin ligase fusions represent a CRISPR-like approach for targeted protein degradation. But why stop there? Our goal is to define the engineering and delivery principles for truly programmable proteome editing outcomes, including degradation, phosphorylation, glycosylation, acetylation, and beyond.