Antoni Luque
Associate Professor, Biology
College of Arts and Science
axl4306@miami.edu
Dr. Luque is a biophysicist who investigates the molecular structure and dynamics of viruses, combining computational biophysics, bioinformatics, predictive modeling, and molecular biology. He earned his Ph.D. from the University of Barcelona and completed postdoctoral training at New York University. Dr. Luque joined the University of Miami in 2023 as an Associate Professor in the Department of Biology, after spending eight years as a principal investigator at the Viral Information Institute at San Diego State University. Dr. Luque’s research has advanced the generalized theory of viral capsids, supporting the discovery of new viruses and the development of gene therapy vectors. He is pioneering methods that combine environmental sequencing, physical virology, and protein engineering to investigate the capsid structure of uncultured viruses and their impact on microbiomes. This work is key to understanding how viruses adapt to different environments and hosts and target potential pathogens that cannot be cultured in the lab. The molecular information obtained from these uncultured viruses, particularly from marine ecosystems and the human gut, also informs the computational approaches used in the lab to design more efficient gene delivery systems with applications in vaccine development and rare diseases.
Keywords: viruses, viral capsids, gene therapy vectors, microbiomes, gene delivery systems, vaccine development
