Education

B.S., 2011, Purdue University
Ph.D., 2017, University of California, Irvine

Honors and Awards

NIH Postdoctoral Fellowship, 2020–2022; MIT Ludwig Center Postdoctoral Fellowship, 2018; UC Regents’ Dissertation Fellowship, 2017; Michael Zach Award for Research and Teaching, 2017; Allergan Graduate Fellowship, 2016.

Research Interests

Research in the Truex lab is devoted to developing protein technologies that draw inspiration from nature and solve real-world problems. Our group is currently focusing on two classes of protein technologies. The first leverages automated flow protein synthesis (AFPS) to give access to novel synthetic proteins that cannot be prepared by other methods. The second technology uses DNA-binding proteins called artificial transcription factors (ATFs) to improve the control of immune function at the transcriptional level. Peptides and proteins serve as our primary tools for research in the lab. Individual projects focus on protein engineering and screening, chemical and peptide synthesis, recombinant protein expression, and biophysical and biological characterization

Selected Publications

Expression and Automated Flow Synthesis of Fold-Switching Proteins Derived from Streptococcus Protein G Kjerfve, C.; Kwao, J. K.; Wolfe, J.; Glover, J.; Wood, B.; Golden, C.; Truex, N. L. Biochemistry 2026, 65, 1224–1232.

Sequence determinants of RNA G-quadruplex unfolding by Arg-rich regions. De Silva, N.I.U.; Kunwar, P.; Rahman, M.I.R.; Kwao, J.K.; Lehman, N.; Zhang,Z.; Paul, T.; Cheng, C.; Truex, N.; Lee, H.-T.; Zhang, J. FEBS Letters 2026, 6, 1373–1385. 

Access to Synthetic Fold-switching Proteins Using Automated Flow Chemistry. Kjerfve, C.; Kwao, J.K.; Glover, J.; Wood, B.; Golden, C.; Truex, N. L. ChemRxiv 2025. DOI: 10.26434/chemrxiv-2025-9l2q

An artificial transcription factor that activates potent interferon-γ expression in human Jurkat T Cells. King, A.; Noblitt, D.; Sherron, O.; Kjerfve, C.; Pless, L.; and Truex, N. L. Front. Mol. Med. 2025, 4, 1492370.