Professor Ashraf Brik, holder of the Jordan and Irene Tark Academic Chair in the Schulich Faculty of Chemistry at the Technion–Israel Institute of Technology, has been named a lead advanced partner in Twin2Degrade, a Horizon Europe Twinning project launched to advance research capacity, training, and innovation in targeted protein degradation, TPD. The recognition adds to a landmark stretch for Brik, who received the American Peptide Society's Vincent du Vigneaud Award in 2025.
Funded through the European Union's Horizon Europe WIDERA Twinning program, Twin2Degrade is coordinated by the National Hellenic Research Foundation, NHRF, in Athens, with the goal of establishing NHRF as a world-class center of excellence in targeted protein degradation, a rapidly growing area of chemical biology and drug discovery in which disease-associated proteins are selectively marked for destruction rather than merely inhibited. The approach, which grew directly out of the ubiquitin–proteasome biology recognized by the 2004 Nobel Prize in Chemistry, has become one of the most active frontiers in modern therapeutic research.
Brik joins an exceptional roster of advanced partners assembled to build NHRF's capacity, including Distinguished Professor Aaron Ciechanover, the Technion Nobel laureate whose work helped establish the ubiquitin system, and Professor Ivan Dikic, Director of the Institute of Biochemistry II at Goethe University Frankfurt. Together, the partners will provide scientific mentoring, strategic guidance, and institutional support to the NHRF team.
Brik's role centers on his internationally recognized expertise in the chemical synthesis and semisynthesis of post-translationally modified proteins. His laboratory was the first to chemically synthesize K48-linked tetraubiquitin chains, and his group develops peptide- and small-molecule modulators targeting deubiquitinases and other disease-related enzymes; capabilities directly relevant to the mechanistic and molecular toolkit that underpins targeted protein degradation. Across the project, advanced partners will contribute to workshops, summer schools, and staff and student exchanges spanning laboratories in Haifa, Frankfurt, and Athens, expanding a European network around the field.
The appointment reflects the standing Brik has earned within the peptide and protein-science community. In addition to the 2025 Vincent du Vigneaud Award, his recent honors include the European Peptide Society's Leonidas Zervas Award, 2024, election to the Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities, 2024, and the Max Bergmann Medal, 2026. His research program has produced more than 200 publications and over 11,000 citations.
The American Peptide Society congratulates Professor Brik on his selection as a Twin2Degrade advanced partner and looks forward to the training and discovery the project will foster across the European research community.
