Preliminary Program

Registration and Abstract Submissions for Travel Awards and Open Talks will open by February 1 

The 41st Annual Symposium is comprised of 12 scientific sessions and eight award speakers totaling over 100 invited and contributed talks speakers. Our program committee, chaired by Karen Allen, Boston University; and Chuck Sanders, Vanderbilt University; and joined by César de la Fuente, University of Pennsylvania; Aitziber López Cortajarena, CIC biomaGUNE; and Bill DeGrado, UCSF, has assembled a program that spans the broad range of protein science, combining critical underpinnings of the field, the latest developments and a vision into the future with career development and technical workshops as well as ample networking opportunities. This year’s symposium continues our commitment to open participation, with each session featuring contributed talks and speakers from across a broad range of topics, and will feature the inaugural recipient of the Martin Karplus Award, established in 2026. 

SESSION 1: Role of Protein Conformational States in Ligand-binding and Therapeutics

Session 1: July 9, 2027 | 9:30 a.m. - 12:15 p.m.

Lindsay Case | Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Adrian Whitty | Boston University

Peter Tonge | Stony Brook University

SESSION 2:  Preventing or Correcting Disease-Causative Misfolding

Session 2: July 9, 2027 | 9:30 a.m. - 12:15 p.m.

Jonathan Schlebach | Purdue University

Sriram Kosuri | Octant

Georgios Skretas | Biomedical Sciences Research Center “Alexander Fleming”

SESSION 3: AI for Protein and Ligand Discovery and Design

Session 3: July 9 | 2 - 4:45 p.m.

Brian Shoichet | University of California San Francisco

Ali Madani | Profluent

Debbie Marks | Harvard University

SESSION 4: Microproteins Come of Age

Session 4: July 9 | 2 - 4:45 p.m.

Sarah Slavoff | Yale University

Alan Saghatelian | Salk Institute for Biological Studies

Anne-Ruxandra Carvunis | ETH Zürich

SESSION 5: Proteins as Redox Carriers

Session 5: July 10, 2027 | 9:30 a.m. - 12:15 p.m.

Sean Elliott | Boston University

Squire Booker | University of Pennsylvania

Kate Pletneva | Dartmouth College

SESSION 6: Protein Solutions to Extraordinary Challenges

Session 6: July 10, 2027 | 9:30 a.m. - 12:15 p.m.

Steven Benner | Foundation For Applied Molecular Evolution 

Loren D. Williams | Georgia Institute of Technology
Protein and RNA: A Match made in the Hadean

Miyo T. Morita | National Institute for Basic Biology

SESSION 7: Enzyme and Protein Design

Session 7: July 10 | 2 - 4:45 p.m.

Birte Hoecker | University of Bayreuth

Roberto Chica | University of Ottawa

Charlotte Deane | Oxford University

SESSION 8: Surprises in the Membrane Realm

Session 8: July 10 | 2 - 4:45 p.m.

Bil Clemons | California Institute of Technology

Karen Fleming | Johns Hopkins University

Wade Van Horn | Arizona State University

SESSION 9: Protein and Pathway Discovery

Session 9: July 11, 2027 | 9:30 a.m. - 12:15 p.m.

Michelle Chang | Princeton University

Vahe Bandarian | University of Utah

Amy Rosenzweig | Northwestern University

SESSION 10: There's a Whole Lot Going On At Ribosomes

Session 10: July 11, 2027 | 9:30 a.m. - 12:15 p.m.

Maria Barna | Stanford University 

Katrin Karbstein | Vanderbilt University

SESSION 11: Proteins That Recognize, Interrogate, and Chemically Transform DNA

Session 11: July 12, 2027 | 9 - 11:35 a.m.

Maria Spies | University of Iowa

Isaac Fianu | California Institute of Technology

Katherine O'Toole | New England Biolabs

SESSION 12: Peptide Design: Peptides as Information and Medicine

Session 12: July 12, 2027 | 9 - 11:35 a.m.

Jiangning Song | Monash University
Decoding Immunity and Designing Therapeutics: AI as a Partner for Next-Generation Biomedical Discovery

Daniela Kalafatovic | University of Rijeka, Croatia

Gaurav Bhardwaj | University of Washington