Computational Design and Modeling of Biomolecules (C5)
March 29-April 1, 2027 | La Fonda on the Plaza, Santa Fe, NM, United States
Nicholas F. Polizzi, Torben Schiffner and Amy E. Keating
* Session Chair † Invited but not yet accepted | Program current as of April 1, 2026 6 PM | For the most up-to-date details, visit https://www.keystonesymposia.org
Monday, March 29, 2027
4:00–8:00 PM Registration
6:00–8:00 PM Welcome Mixer
Tuesday, March 30, 2027
7:00–8:00 AM Breakfast
8:00–8:10 AM Welcome Remarks
8:10–9:00 AM Keynote Address
  Frances H. Arnold †, California Institute of Technology
Directed Evolution Meets Machine Learning: Evolving Novel Catalysts with Predictive Design
 
9:00–11:15 AM Binders, Boltz, and Beyond
  Amy E. Keating, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Predicting and Designing Protein–Peptide Interaction Specificity with Computational Models
 
  John Chodera †, Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center
Free-Energy Calculations at Scale: Predicting Affinity and Selectivity for Protein–Ligand Design
 
  Gabriele Corso †, Boltz
Generative AI for Protein Design and Structure Prediction
 
  Short Talk(s) Chosen from Abstracts
 
9:30–9:50 AM Coffee Break
11:15–12:15 PM Panel Discussion: How to Write Papers for Biology & Comp Sci Audiences
12:15–1:00 PM Poster Setup
12:15–5:00 PM On Own for Lunch
1:00–10:00 PM Poster Viewing
2:30–4:30 PM Symposia Spotlight 1: Methods and Applications for Design of Complex Function
  Short Talks Chosen from Abstracts
 
4:30–5:00 PM Coffee Available
5:00–7:00 PM An Ensemble Cast: A Protein in Many Acts
  Frank DiMaio †, University of Washington
Modeling Conformational Ensembles
 
  Nicholas F. Polizzi, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute
De novo Design of a Single-Chain Small-Molecule Biosensor
 
  Anum Glasgow †, Columbia University
Rewiring Allosteric Signaling in Cellular Proteins Using Rational and ML-Driven Approaches
 
  Short Talk(s) Chosen from Abstracts
 
7:00–8:00 PM Social Hour with Dinner
7:30–10:00 PM Posters
Wednesday, March 31, 2027
7:00–8:00 AM Breakfast
8:00–11:00 AM Data, Robots, and Models (O My)
  Philip Romero †, Duke University
Closed-Loop Protein Engineering: Integrating Robotics, ML, and Massive Sequence–Function Maps
 
  Huimin Zhao †, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Scaling Up the Biofoundry: High-Throughput Genetic and Enzymatic Function Discovery with AI in the Loop
 
  Polly Fordyce †, Stanford University
Evolutionary-Scale Enzymology Enables Exploration of a Rugged Catalytic Landscape
 
  Chris Bahl †, AI Proteins, Inc.
Designing Therapeutic Miniproteins using Automation
 
  Short Talk(s) Chosen from Abstracts
 
9:00–9:20 AM Coffee Break
11:00–1:00 PM Poster Setup
11:00–5:00 PM On Own for Lunch
1:00–10:00 PM Poster Viewing
3:00–4:30 PM Career Roundtable
4:30–5:00 PM Coffee Available
5:00–7:00 PM Active Sites and Ambitions: Designer Enzymes
  Brian Kuhlman †, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
The Folding- and Catalytic-Thermodynamics of Designed and Natural Enzymes
 
  Lucy Jane Colwell †, University of Cambridge, Google DeepMind
Mechanistic Insights from Designed Enzymes: Toward Tailor-Made Catalysts for New Chemistry
 
  Birte Höcker †, University of Bayreuth
Design of Lid Motifs in TIM Barrels for Catalysis
 
  Ali Madani †, Profluent Bio
Design of Functional Gene Editors using PLMs
 
  Short Talk(s) Chosen from Abstracts
 
7:00–8:00 PM Social Hour with Dinner
7:30–10:00 PM Posters
Thursday, April 1, 2027
7:00–8:00 AM Breakfast
8:00–11:00 AM Into the Wild Type: Designed Proteins Meet Biology
  Neil P King †, University of Washington
From Nanoparticles to Immunogens: Designing Functional Protein Assemblies for Biological Applications
 
  Torben Schiffner, Scripps Research
Programmable Protein Scaffolds for Targeted Immune Modulation and Viral Neutralization
 
  Glenna Foight †, Baylor College of Medicine
Synthetic Transcription Factors and Designer Proteins for Controlling Immune Cell Fate
 
  Dek Woolfson †, University of Bristol
Assembling Membraneless Organelles from de novo Designed Proteins
 
  Short Talk(s) Chosen from Abstracts
 
9:00–9:20 AM Coffee Break
11:00–12:00 PM Workshop: Hands-On Code Tutorial: Fine-Tuning Models / RL
12:00–5:00 PM On Own for Lunch
2:30–4:30 PM Symposia Spotlight 2: Late-breaking research presentations selected from abstract submissions
  Short Talks Chosen from Abstracts
 
4:30–5:00 PM Coffee Available
5:00–6:45 PM Weight, Weight, Don't Tell Me: Emerging Methods in Machine Learning
  Olexandr Isayev †, Carnegie Mellon University
AI Models for Chemistry at the Protein Interface: Learned Potentials for Reactivity and Binding
 
  Noelia Ferruz †, Centre for Genomic Regulation
Toward the Explainability of Protein Language Models for Sequence Design
 
  Jennifer Listgarten †, University of California, Berkeley
ProteinGuide: On-the-Fly Property Guidance for Protein Sequence Generative Models
 
  Sergey Ovchinnikov †, MIT
Protein Diffusion Models as Statistical Potentials
 
  Short Talk(s) Chosen from Abstracts
 
6:45–7:00 PM Meeting Wrap-Up: Outcomes and Future Directions
7:00–8:00 PM Social Hour with Dinner
8:00–11:00 PM Entertainment
8:00–11:00 PM Cash Bar
Friday, April 2, 2027
12:00–11:59 PM Departure