Brian Kuhlman

Brian Kuhlman is a Professor of Biochemistry and Biophysics at the University of North Carolina (UNC) at Chapel Hill School of Medicine, a member of the UNC Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center, and Co-Director of the UNC Molecular and Cellular Biophysics Program. He earned his PhD from SUNY Stony Brook and previously contributed to groundbreaking computational protein design work as a postdoctoral researcher in David Baker’s lab, including the development of the Top7 protein that underpinned Nobel Prize-winning research.

Research Interests: His lab focuses on computational and experimental protein design, utilizing the Rosetta software suite. Key areas include

• De novo protein design for therapeutic applications
• Optogenetic control of biological processes
• Antibody engineering for cancer and infectious disease
• Protein stability and mutation effect prediction
• Structure-guided vaccine development

Recent Highlights: The lab has advanced dengue virus envelope protein stabilization for vaccines and developed light-activatable protein switches. Their work spans enzyme specificity tailoring, therapeutic bispecific antibody design, and Rosetta energy function optimization.

Scientific Awards:

• National Academy of Inventors Senior Member (2025)
• ASBMB DeLano Award for Computational Biosciences (2019)
• Searle Scholar (2004-2007)
• Beckman Young Investigator (2004-2007)

Collaborations and Grants: The lab collaborates with Eli Lilly on bispecific antibody strategies and has received funding from the W.M. Keck Foundation (2005-2010). They are part of the RosettaCommons consortium, contributing to Rosetta software development.