Associate Professor | Head of the Dioscuri Centre for Structural Dynamics of Receptors
Przemek is a structural biochemist specializing in the molecular mechanisms of photoreception and ion transport in membrane proteins. Using serial crystallography, synchrotron radiation, and X-ray Free Electron Lasers (XFELs), he captures proteins in action—producing atomic-resolution snapshots of biological processes that occur on timescales from femtoseconds to milliseconds.
He earned his Ph.D. in Structural Biochemistry at ITQB, Universidade NOVA de Lisboa, then joined the Paul Scherrer Institute as a Marie Curie Postdoctoral Fellow, where he contributed to the applications of high-viscosity crystal delivery systems that are now standard at synchrotron facilities worldwide. In 2017, he started an independent research group at ETH Zurich as an SNSF Ambizione Fellow. Since 2022, he has led the Dioscuri Centre of Excellence at Jagiellonian University in Kraków, supported by the Max Planck Society and the National Science Centre Poland.
His 32 publications, including 4 in *Science*, 2 in *Nature*, and *Cell*, feature the first femtosecond movie of retinal isomerization in bacteriorhodopsin, one of the most detailed mechanistic portraits of a light-driven chloride pump, and pioneering work on the ultrafast structural events that initiate vision. Ongoing research aims to advance next-generation structural methods for tracking biological reactions in real time.