Chris Serpell

We're now recruiting early career group leaders at the Crick to lead ambitious research programmes and explore bold scientific questions.

Hear our Director, Edith Heard, explain why the Crick is a unique place for curiosity-driven research.

Apply now ➡️ www.crick.ac.uk/careers-stud...

I need to check - does the Funding Service website work in China?

We've got a DNA-amyloid protein one in the works...

Self-assembly of (poly)peptide-oligonucleotide conjugates: from orthogonality to emergence Peptides and DNA both display characteristic self-assembly motifs which underpin the spectacularly varied and functional nanostructures of biology. Ea…

Thanks to @jesspanch.bsky.social at Trends in Chemistry for handling this review article on DNA-peptide self-assembly which is just out. This outlook is going to frame some more papers you'll see coming out my lab over the next year or so.
www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

Postdoc position open for applications until 8th Sept! www.ucl.ac.uk/work-at-ucl/...

vMASC Call For Abstracts (for 2025/26) vMASC Early-Career Seminars: Call for Abstracts The organising committee of the virtual Macrocyclic and Supramolecular Chemistry (vMASC) seminar series are inviting abstracts from all early-career …

📣 Call for Abstracts - vMASC 📣

We are currently inviting abstracts from all early-career researchers (Master’s, PhD, PDRA) for oral presentations in 2025/2026 as part of our monthly vMASC seminar series.

Submission deadline 📆 18th Aug 2025

Find out more on mascgroup.co.uk/vmasc-4/vmas...

Sequence-defined phosphoestamers for selective inhibition of the KRASG12D/RAF1 interaction RAS proteins are the most frequently mutated in cancer, yet they have proved extremely difficult to target in drug discovery, largely because interfering with the interaction of RAS with its downstrea...

Underpinning science here: pubs.rsc.org/en/content/a...

UCL – University College London UCL is consistently ranked as one of the top ten universities in the world (QS World University Rankings 2010-2022) and is No.2 in the UK for research power (Research Excellence Framework 2021).

I've got a postdoc position open @ucl.ac.uk - using phosphoestamers to block oncogenic protein-protein interactions. Large collaboration, translational outlook, cool chemistry underneath! www.ucl.ac.uk/work-at-ucl/...

It can Hoogsteen plenty, and it can do cool things with other molecules (like cyanuric acid), and nature thinks it's cool enough to stick a pile of them on the end of every RNA, as well as the whole ATP thing...

I like G because it has a guanidine in it. But A's my favourite, because it's manages without oxygen.

...and "no safe dose" is a stupid thing to say when apparently there's even a safe dose of botulinum toxin

Pretty much in agreement here. This may be chemist bias, but in the end, the only question I have about food is what stuff is actually in it.
Is UPF status a state function?

It's true once you get above a certain temperature

Perhaps the problem is not with the UK...

You take that back about beer. Nowhere in the world is there anything as good as British ale.

PharmAlliance creates all kinds of opportunities for collaboration between UCL, UNC, and Monash

A great group outing to Bloomsbury Lanes!

I feel for you.

You should see people's faces when I tell them I'm an Associate Professor of Drug Discovery

This is the best

Hating on “Big Pharma”? Cool, it’s a $1.6 trillion regulated industry. But hang on…the $6.3 trillion wellness industry sells you mushroom tea, dewormers, crash diets, and alkaline water—no regulations, no oversight. But hey, it’s ‘natural,’ right?

Thanks, AI

Peptide design to control protein–protein interactions Targeting of protein–protein interactions has become of huge interest in every aspect of medicinal and biological sciences. The control of protein interactions selectively offers the opportunity to co...

Want to take on a new protein-protein interaction but don't know where to start? Have a look at our latest review in @chemsocrev.bsky.social on designing peptides to control protein interactions.
doi.org/10.1039/D4CS...

I will be referencing this paper in nearly every manuscript and grant application until someone beats its record.

Come join our lab @crick.ac.uk and KCL - looking for a Chemical Biologist, ideally with experience of assay design, to lead our chemical biology work, collaborating across my group, and driving forward basic and translational projects tinyurl.com/4h732e22 closes 23/2! 24-month post initially

UCL – University College London UCL is consistently ranked as one of the top ten universities in the world (QS World University Rankings 2010-2022) and is No.2 in the UK for research power (Research Excellence Framework 2021).

We're looking for a postdoc to join the group at @ucl.ac.uk School of Pharmacy to use sequence to tie polymers in knots. Come and combine supramolecular chemistry with precision synthetic macromolecules!
www.ucl.ac.uk/work-at-ucl/...

I finally made a new group website for UCL! Basic for now, but has the key info: blogs.ucl.ac.uk/serpell/

Barry, no!

Unexpected from a society for those who love dross.

Me too. See you next year?