David Perez, PhD

My academic career started at Stetson University, where I completed a Bachelor of Science degree in biochemistry and had an initial exposure to research through a research experience for undergraduates NSF program at Florida International University under the guidance of Dr. Jaroslava Miksovska and former graduate student Walter G. Gonzalez. I continued to pursue a PhD in Chemistry with a focus on enzymology in the Butcher lab at the University of Florida under the mentorship of Dr. Rebecca A. Butcher, which culminated in the discovery of an ATP-mediated allosteric mechanism that regulates the activity of an acyl-CoA oxidase. As part of my work in the Butcher lab, I harnessed my skills in the use of computational tools to study proteins and the development of assays using chemical and biophysical techniques to probe the function and structure of proteins. Currently, I am part of the Luca lab, where I am interrogating immunological and cellular development signaling mechanisms that can be targeted for the development of disease-related therapeutics by the application of a structure-guided approach to protein engineering.