Kevin Weeks
Professor, Department of Chemistry UNC at Chapel Hill
Chemist, teacher and mentor at the University of North Carolina, biotech enthusiast and company founder, and trail runner. I have taught thousands of students first-year chemistry, am a founder at ForagR Medicines, Ribometrix and A-Form Solutions, and have the super power of noticing the potential for excellence in others.
Seminars
A major challenge in RNA-targeted drug discovery is determining where small molecules bind on RNA, what structures they recognize, and whether those binding events translate into functional outcomes. As structural, probing, and biophysical tools advance, the field still lacks standardized approaches for connecting RNA structure, binding-site identification, and compound optimization.
Join medicinal chemists, structural biologists, RNA biologists, and teams improving structure-guided design to explore practical strategies for:
- Predicting RNA ligandability by identifying structures that can support selective small-molecule binding
- Prioritizing tractable RNA targets by linking function, binding pockets and confidence in on-target engagement
- Evaluating biophysical and structural methods to measure RNA ligand recognition, affinity and conformational change
- Targeting MYC mRNA through fragment-based small molecule discovery
- Achieving translation knockdown with direct RNA-binding fragments
- Achieving over 70% translation knockdown on various RNAs
- Validating conventional non-covalent approaches for RNA modulation
