Degree(s)

PhD synthetic-medicinal chemistry, University of Newcastle, Australia

Profile

Past Member To and From Dates: April 2023-July 2023
Past Member Current Position: Assistant Professor (Chemical Biology and Medicinal Chemistry)at the TU/e

Peter completed his undergraduate with honours and Ph.D. in synthetic-medicinal chemistry at the University of Newcastle, AU, in the group of Professor Adam McCluskey. His Ph.D. project developed small molecule protein-protein interaction inhibitors as antibacterial agents. Peter then moved to the Technical University of Eindhoven (TU/e), NL, in 2018 as a Marie Skłodowska-Curie postdoctoral fellow in the group of Associate Professor Christian Ottmann. Here he developed his skills in chemical biology and structural biology. He worked on the development of molecular glues that target native 14-3-3/client protein complexes. Peter then took up a role as team leader in the group of Prof. Luc Brunsveld, where he led a team that developed a peptide-based molecular glue and pioneered a new approach in fragment-based drug discovery termed ‘dual covalent molecular locking’. In 2021, Peter was awarded the national Dutch talent program fellowship the Veni to work on target protein degradation of intrinsically disordered proteins. In 2023, he started as an Assistant Professor in chemical biology and medicinal chemistry at the TU/e. His group consists of two PhD students, Carlo Verhoef and Siebe van Elzen, and two Master’s students, Wim Nijskens and Tessa Harzing. Peter is currently a visiting researcher associate at the Center for Target Protein Degradation (ceTPD) at the University of Dundee, in the group of Professor Alessio Ciulli. Outside of research, Peter is enthusiastic about the outdoors, specifically climbing, cycling, and hiking.