Peter Wright

Peter Wright, PhD, is a Professor in the Department of Integrative Structural and Computational Biology at The Scripps Research Institute (TSRI). He holds the Cecil H. and Ida M. Green Investigator endowed chair. Wright’s research focuses on protein structure, dynamics, and interactions using techniques like NMR spectroscopy. His work emphasizes intrinsically disordered proteins, protein folding/misfolding mechanisms, and amyloid aggregation. He has pioneered studies on transthyretin aggregation linked to amyloid diseases and the dynamics of enzymes like dihydrofolate reductase.

Education: B.S., M.S., and Ph.D. in Chemistry from the University of Auckland (1968–1972). Postdoctoral training at the University of Oxford (1972–1976). Professional roles include Chair of TSRI’s Department of Molecular Biology (1987–2012) and leadership in collaborative projects with Ashok Deniz (single-molecule FRET) and Ian Wilson (X-ray crystallography).

Research interests span intrinsically disordered proteins’ roles in cellular signaling, zinc finger nucleic acid recognition, and protein dynamics. His lab combines NMR, X-ray crystallography, and computational methods. Awards include the NIH Merit Award, National Academy of Sciences membership, and multiple honorary doctorates.

Key grants include NIH funding for amyloidosis research. His lab’s innovations include intein labeling technologies and NMR relaxation dispersion techniques to study protein excited states. Collaborations include work on muscleblind RNA recognition and Kaiso DNA binding mechanisms.