Peter Blas is a Daphne Jackson Fellow at the University of Leicester in the Leicester Institute of Structural and Chemical Biology (LISCB).

After a BSc in Chemistry and an MSc in Biochemical Engineering, Peter studied for a PhD at University College London on Ultra scale-down Analysis and Bioprocessing of Fusion Proteins. During his PhD, Peter applied for a University College London, Cross Disciplinary scholarship for which he had to submit a research proposal. He won the scholarship, and his project brought together the Department of Biochemical Engineering, the Department of Biochemistry, and the Royal Free Hospital, where he worked for a year on production of monoclonal antibody fusion proteins.

Peter continued his career as a teacher of Science and A Level Chemistry and is now returning to research after a break of fourteen years. His project will refresh his skills, along with adding new ones. A major challenge in pharmaceutical research and development is to develop new cancer drugs that overcome issues associated with drug resistance, negative side effects or hard to treat cancers, so the long term aim of Peter’s research is to halt the progression of cancerous growth in a highly specific manner that does not give rise to unwanted side effects and circumvents resistance pathways.

The University of Leicester and the Royal Society of Chemistry are sponsoring Peter’s Fellowship, which is due to finish in 2024, and his project is entitled: Inhibiting Pin1 in Cancer Through Induced Kinase Proximity using Chimeric Small Molecules