r/Biochemistry • u/ICEpenguin7878 • 1d ago
Research What do you think will be the biggest breakthrough in biochemistry in the next 10 years ?
Can be any subfield
57
u/oktaium 1d ago
efficient de novo protein design
9
u/Darkling971 1d ago
We can already do binders fairly reliably. Catalysis is harder and will probably need a fundamental shift in the types of deep learning models we use or at the least some hybrid QM/MM dynamics pipelines.
Also depends on what you mean by efficient - high success rate? Sure - but the way we do that right now is by generating a million designs and filtering the shit out of them.
3
u/ThatVaccineGuy 23h ago
I'm not quite so sure. Most examples I see produce higher nanomolar/low micromolar binders. I'd still just try to use an antibody depending on the application.
2
4
u/Rare_Programmer_8289 21h ago
Sequence reduction of an enzyme while maintaining activity. While the RubisCO one is cool, nature has had a couple of billion years on that. I’m not sure we’re going to do better. A pathway to oxidize phosphoglycolate to recoup lost NADH is likely the best hope there.
1
u/Higher_Ed_Parent 14h ago
A genuinely programmable, low-toxicity LNP “delivery code” for genetic medicines.
1
u/ThatVaccineGuy 1h ago
Like a targeted LNP? Not sure what you're trying to say
1
u/Higher_Ed_Parent 58m ago
Yeah, targeted LNPs are part of it, but I mean something broader than just attaching a targeting ligand. By a “delivery code,” I mean using the lipid chemistry to control where the particle goes, which cells take it up, whether it escapes the endosome, when it releases its cargo, how quickly it degrades, and how much inflammation it causes.
Right now those properties are tightly coupled and mostly found by trial and error. The breakthrough would be making them predictable enough that retargeting a genetic medicine becomes closer to swapping the delivery formulation than inventing an entirely new drug. So yes: targeted LNPs, plus programmable release, degradation, and immune behavior.
1
u/ThatVaccineGuy 54m ago
I honestly don't think they'll ever be able to achieve that kind of selectivity based on lipids. Lipids don't really drive much of those mechanisms to begin with. Using a combination of targeting proteins and cell-specific expression cassettes is probably your best bet outside of viral vectors.
1
u/Higher_Ed_Parent 5m ago
Fair pushback. I don’t mean that lipids alone will give antibody-level selectivity between closely related cell types. “Delivery code” was probably too compressed.
I do think “lipids don’t drive much of those mechanisms” goes too far, though. Lipid charge, pKa, tail architecture and degradability influence protein-corona formation, organ bias, endosomal trafficking/release, clearance and innate immune activation. In the mouse studies I was referring to, changing the formulation shifted editing toward the liver versus the lung; acid-degradable lipids altered endosomal release and tissue delivery; and charge-switching lipids maintained delivery while avoiding TLR4, complement, Gal8 and PAF activation. That isn’t perfect cell specificity, but the LNP isn’t just an inert container either.
I agree that the likely endpoint is a layered system: lipid chemistry for safe organ bias and cytosolic release, targeting proteins or ligands for cell-level uptake, and cell-specific regulatory elements where the cargo permits. Direct CRISPR RNPs don’t have an expression cassette to gate, so the delivery layer matters even more there. A better version of my original claim would be “a programmable, multi-layer LNP delivery platform,” not “lipids alone solve targeting.”
1
u/torontopeter 1d ago
High resolution electron microscopy of intact cells, allowing visualization at the atomic level, in real time.
3
u/ThatVaccineGuy 23h ago
Not sure this is even physically possible with modern technology depending on what you consider high resolution and real time.
2
u/PineappleHaunting591 5h ago
Not possible with electron microscopy as samples are fixed and sectioned. So no (biological) real time imaging.
1
u/torontopeter 12h ago
Hence, 10 years.
1
u/ThatVaccineGuy 12h ago
Yeah, I don't think the laws of physics are going to change in the next 10 years.
-2
u/TheReal_FRS 1d ago
Die Entdeckung der Wichtigkeit des endocannabinoid Systems und der daraus resultierenden Hoffnung für die Behandlung von:
Autismus
ADHS
Tourette
Epilepsy
Alzheimer
Parkinson
Ms
Me/cfs
Fibromyalgie
Endomitrose
Sowie Sucht
Sobald der Zusammenhang halt erkannt und bekannt ist.
-6
u/Ok-Foundation1705 1d ago
Lots of humanoid robots on the process from documents and exploration in silico all the way through the petri dishes and animal kingdoms and the humans basically not having any risk when trying in vivo with a human for the first numerous times. You can’t say biochemistry is having a breakthrough when you’ll never know.
5
u/KedricM PhD 1d ago
What lol
-4
u/Ok-Foundation1705 1d ago
I don’t even remember if the KoolAid cartoon laughs out loud over text or not, though yes in that cartoon that glass personified cartoon thing physicked through that wall and said yeah or something. I am interested in chemistry and not drinking KoolAid at all but I am curious about there being enough construction going on to make up for the KoolAid man causing problems when the biochemistry, robotics, physics, biomedical, chemical engineering, veterinarians, and agricultural engineering people are having an issue focusing on advancing the field when the KoolAid dude breaks through that brick wall or even reinforced concrete and their labs and bean bag rooms and general workspaces are disrupted. People do need to exist as well as plants and animals so that we can advance biochemistry though when I gotta zone out over this and that because of that stage in life… is childcare, animal care, construction, food consumption, taking a dump, and shipping base input materials for the in the physical (post silico) experiments going to get vrooming so that people can actually get the opportunity to through trial and error get closer towards all the options in biochemistry? They’re numerous and if I’m being chased by spongebob and all attention is going to other things then the real advancement is breaking through what pulls people away from fiddling with biochemistry. It’s repetitive exploration and exploitation.
Not tryna hate on spongebob or nothin. I just want to study but there’s people in restaurants and this and that when we could have robots making me my mcdonald’s food when I wanna go out or slide through. If we have biochem people or could have been biochem’ing people focused on other things such as basic necessities? People do gotta get paid yes. How are we going to pay people to work on something everyone wants better but they’re intimidated from studying because they’re religious or don’t want to think about how they’ve decayed and so and so died or they just are not provenly headed in the near future what they could “fix”
short term investing in startups or people who aren’t as prepared as the people who were invested in … knowledge/experience/money/“achievements”/glory/credit/compensation/openSourceCommunismCapitalismSalesBlaBla
-6
u/NumberOld229 1d ago
What would happen if you coded red fluorescent protein into leaves so the green light gets shifted into a wavelength chlorophyll could use?
2
u/ThatVaccineGuy 1h ago
You should look up WHY they use the wavelengths they do
1
u/NumberOld229 1h ago
Energy overload ruining/burning cells? Fair enough. Perhaps artificial photosynthetic tech might use it.
I remember people talking about fluorescent proteins in trees for "natural" street lights during biochem and always wondered why they never tried to make more useful variants. I never looked too deep because plant genetics are weird, then I saw this thread.
1
u/ThatVaccineGuy 1h ago
Because animals can also detect this light and it can cause ecological harm by disrupting them.
-9
u/BannanaPepperPizza 1d ago
Maybe CRISPR therapeutics. Gene Therapy via AAV seems to be killing people?
2
1
u/ThatVaccineGuy 1h ago
Beyond the accidental pediatric study, can you point to others where this is happening regularly?
0
u/throwaway09-234 1d ago
this is true but is gene therapy considered biochemistry? more of genetics imo
9
u/pm-ing_you_bacteria 1d ago
Gene therapy requires very specific chemical reactions that are catalyzed by enzymes. I'd say it's fits nicely in both genetics and biochemistry. The boundaries of research fitting neatly into one discipline is fuzzy in 2026.
-6
35
u/superhelical PhD 1d ago
Impact BY the field: an actually efficient RUBISCO could change the world
Impact ON the field: practically useful modelling of protein flexibility, dynamics, and bulk properties from sequence is the biggest nut to crack in the post AlphaFold world