Douglas Theobald

The goal of my research is to understand with atomic precision how macromolecules evolve novel structures, complexes, mechanisms, and functions. We characterize the specific dynamic pathways taken by enzymes during their evolution, by resurrecting lineages of ancestral enzymes along multiple evolutionary pathways. We analyze their functions and mechanisms biochemically and determine their structures. This work is highly interdisciplinary, relying on X-ray crystallography, enzymology, phylogenetics, bioinformatics, machine learning, and population genetics.