Christian Diercks, PhD

The Diercks lab leverages our T7-ORACLE system for continuous hypermutation and accelerated evolution in E. coli to outstanding challenges in human health and synthetic biology. Areas of interest comprise directed evolution to repurpose BoNT/A (Botox) protease as a therapeutic for cancer and pain, directed evolution of enzyme replacement therapies in lysosomal storage diseases, affinity maturation of highly specific antibodies, as well as new technologies for genetic code expansion. These areas have remained underexplored in the context of directed evolution, largely due to the fact that conventional evolution systems render pursuing extensive high-throughput evolution campaigns too laborious and time consuming in an academic setting. The lab further aims to expand the concept of directed evolution from biomacromolecules to new-to-nature abiological materials. Efforts toward this goal focus on endowing nanostructured materials with a selectable genotype/phenotype for the development of non-viral gene delivery vehicles with improved tissue/cell type tropism, endosomal escape, and intracellular trafficking

Representative Publications

1.     C. S. Diercks*, P. Sondermann, C. Rong, T. G. Gillis, Y. Ban, C. Wang, D. A. Dik, P. G. Schultz*, An Orthogonal T7 Replisome for Continuous Hypermutation and Accelerated Evolution in E. coli. Science, 2025, 389 (6760), 618–622.?

2.     P. Sondermann, C. S. Diercks, C. Rong, P. G. Schultz*, Targeted Degradation of a-Synuclein Using an Evolved Botulinum Toxin Protease. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U. S. A.  2025, 122 (13), e2426745122.

3.     M. Pigula, Y.-C. Lai, M. Koh, C. S. Diercks, T. F. Rogers, D. A. Dik*, P. G. Schultz*, An Unnatural Amino Acid Dependent, Conditional Pseudomonas Vaccine Prevents Bacterial Infection, Nat. Commun. 2024, 15 (1), 6766.

4.     C. S. Diercks, D. A. Dik, P. G. Schultz*, Adding new chemistries to the central dogma of molecular biology. Chem, 2021, 7, 2883–2895.?

5.     C. S. Diercks, O. M. Yaghi*, The atom, the molecule, and the covalent organic framework, Science, 2017, 355, 923.

6.     S.Lin,^# C. S. Diercks,^# Y.-B. Zhang,# N. Kornienko, E. M. Nichols, Y. Zhao, A. R. Paris, D. Kim, P. Yang, O. M. Yaghi*, C. J. Chang*, Covalent organic frameworks comprising cobalt porphyrins for the electrocatalytic reduction of carbon dioxide in water. Science, 2015, 349, 1208–1213.?