The Skaggs Institute for Chemical Biology

In 1996, the Skaggs Institute for Chemical Biology was established by an extraordinary gift of $100 million from Aline W. and L.S. Skaggs, made through the Skaggs Institute for Research, to create a powerful nexus for the interface of chemistry and biology. Scientific members of the Skaggs Institute also hold appointments in one of Scripps Research’s departments and have broad expertise to lead research to determine the structure of biological macromolecules, devise chemical and antibody catalysts, synthesize natural products and combinatorial libraries, effect molecular recognition, and design methods for molecular modeling.

Accomplishments to date include determining the crystal structure of the T-cell receptor, synthesizing anti-tumor agents, discovering multipurpose antibodies, characterizing lipid-like hormones, regulating cell adhesion molecules, and the invention of self-replicating peptides. One initiative in RNA chemistry and biology is focused on understanding the structure and function of these key molecules of life—understanding that will ultimately lead to new therapeutic agents. Another is advancing work in molecular evolution. A third brings the institute’s structural and computational facilities for proteins and nucleic acids to bear on organic synthesis and combinatorial chemistry.

The capacity of the Skaggs Institute to assume broad, long-term projects makes it unique at Scripps Research and in its field. Nowhere is its potential clearer than in new opportunities presented by sequencing the genomes of living organisms and applying the resulting biological information to science at the molecular level. The goal of the Skaggs Institute is to perpetuate this rapid flow of information, experimentation, and discovery across the connection of chemistry and biology by sustaining the environment of cross-disciplinary collaboration that has distinguished its work for a decade.