Understanding biological systems at a molecular level and using chemical strategies to interrogate or modify them are currently two of the most exciting goals for chemists worldwide. Research in this department covers a wide range of topics in these contexts and is grouped into the themes below. Advances in these areas will have significant human and economic impact through initiatives as diverse as medicinal chemistry and energy harvesting. A variety of chemical methodologies underpin each of these areas; from theory, informatics, chemical physics, spectroscopy, synthesis, protein and nucleic acid engineering through to manipulation of whole organisms. Around one third of the faculty members of the chemistry department have research activities within these themes and are building on a great history of chemical research applied to fundamental biological problems in Cambridge. We have strong interactions and many joint programmes with biological departments and research institutes in and around Cambridge.

Our common themes are:

1.    Biophysical and spectroscopic studies of macromolecule structure, dynamics and function both in vitro and in vivo

•      Protein folding, misfolding, self-assembly and aggregation in health and disease  (Barker, Best, Bond, Clarke, Dobson, Jackson, Itzhaki, Klenerman, Knowles, Scherman, Wales, Vendrusculo)

•      Nucleic Acid structures and their dynamic properties (Balasubramanian)

•      Multi-protein complexes and protein-protein interactions (Ciulli, Clarke, Itzhaki, Jackson)

•      Protein localisation and function in cells (Klenerman)

•      Tissue structure and assembly (Duer)

•      The development and of new biophysical methods for the study of macromolecular properties (Duer, Klenerman, Knowles)

2.    Small molecule intervention in biological processes             

•      Fundamentals of small molecule recognition by protein and nucleic acid and the thermodynamics of drug discovery. (Abell, Barker, Balasubramanian, Bender, Bond, Ciulli, Jackson, Leeper, Wales)

•      Medicinal chemistry: fragment based approaches (Abell, Ciulli, Balasubramanian, Bender); metallodrugs (Barker, Boss);  Antimicrobials (Spring).

•      Diagnosis and prevention of protein aggregation processes (Dobson, Jackson, Scherman, Vendrusculo)

•      Small molecule systems biology (Glen, Bender) and cellular probes (Leeper, Spring)

3.    New biologically inspired catalysts, responsive materials and synthetic biology

•      Evolution and synthesis of new catalytic biomolecules (Abell, Chin)

•      Energy harvesting and transduction (Reisner, Barker, Scherman)

•      Synthetic methodology: Transformative synthesis (Ley, Gaunt); Combinatorial Chemistry (Spring), Enzyme and cofactor chemistry (Leeper), Inorganic methods (Boss, Reisner)

•      Responsive peptide and protein nanomaterials (Barker, Dobson, Itzhaki, Knowles, Scherman)