Members of the Lab

Undergraduates


Glenn Guglietta

B.S. Chemical Engineering, UMD (2009)

Research Topics

Initial studies on H2 storage in Gas Hydrates.

Placement

Ph.D. program at Drexel University.


Joseph Lim

B.S. Chemical Engineering & Biochemistry, UMD (2010)
Sc.D. Chemical Engineering & MIT
(2015)

Research Topics

Simulation studies of model yeast and Chyladmida membranes. MD simulations of the peripherial membranes protein Osh4.

Awards: UMD Bioscience Day (2008) best poster (Biochem/Biophys) and HHMI Undergrad Fellowship (2009-2010)

Placement

Ph.D. program at MIT. (NSF Graduate Fellow in ChemE, graduated)
Current: Yale Medical School


Joseph O'Connor

B.S. Chemical Engineering, UMD (2010)

Research Topics

Simulation studies DMPC/cholesterol bilayer with a majority of cholesterol. Interactions of AQP0 with these model membranes.

Placement

Penn State Ph.D. in Chemical Engineeering

Arpan A. Bandyopadhyay

B.S. Chemical Engineering, IIT-Bombay (2012)

Research Topics

Thermodynamic modeling of gas hydrates in electrolyte solutions.

Placement

Ph.D. program at the University of Minnesota.


Ivy Muregi

B.S. Chemical Engineering, UMD (2012)

Research Topics

Studies of model asphaletene aggregration in water and organic solvents.

Placement

Consultanting engineer at Accenture


Diana Villanueva

B.S. Chemical Engineering, UMD (2013)

Research Topics

Diana aided in force field development and interesting studies of oxidized lipids. She has tested a new united atom chain model for the CHARMM lipid force field. However, her main project was studies of oxidized lipid models and how these influence bilayer properties. Her research has indicated how the oxidized lipids can alter the stability of lipid membranes.

Award: Travel award to the ACC "Meeting of Minds" Research Conference (2011)

Placement

GSK (Rockville, MD) as a Biopharmaceutical Manufacturing Engineer

Robert Pullen

B.S. Chemical Engineering, UMD (2013)

Research Topics

Rob began simulations of lipid bilayers and the influence of their stability with ethanol. The applications to this are for studying the effects of byproducts of biofuels production.

Placement

Ph.D. Program at the University of Tennessee (Knoxville)


Generic

Alan Tran

B.S. Chemistry, UMD (May 2014)

Research Topics

Alan's research ocused on aiding in the development of a new united atom chain model for the CHARMM lipid force field.

Placement

Graduate Studies at UMD and working as a pharmacy technician


Weglein

David Weglein

B.S. Chemical Engineering, UMD (May 2014)

Research Topics

David research involved simulation studies of a bilayer DOPC for future studies of peptide binding.

Placement

TBD


Daristotle

John Daristotle

B.S. Chemical Engineering, UMD (May 2014)

Research Topics

John's reserach involved studies of ethanol and its interaction with model membranes. His focus was on how ethanol influence structural and dynamical properties of POPE bilayers. Ultimate interest in this work is the effect of toxic products/byproducts to cell membrane during biofuels production.

Placement

Ph.D. Bioengineering at UMD


Generic

Sarah Lee

B.S. Chemistry, UMD (May 2014)

Research Topics

Sarah's research initially focused on aiding in the development of a new united atom chain model for the CHARMM lipid force field. This has resulted in faster simulations for systems that do not require the all-atom detail for the acyl-lipid chain. She also studied peptide binding of the ALPS-like motif to membranes under the advisement of Viviana.

Placement

University of Maryland Easter Shore School of Pharmacy (Pharm.D.)


Allsopp

Matthew Allsopp

B.S. Chemical Engineering, UMD (May 2014)

Research Topics

Matthew's interest lied in the self-assembly of amphillic molecules. He probed the ability of the CHARMM-UA force field to describe surfactant self-assembly. He also started work on MD simulations of potential pore-forming lipids.

Placement

M.Eng. Georgia Tech.
Current: Sumitomo Bakelite High Performance Plastics


Makeover

Judah Makover

B.S. Chemical Engineering, UMD (May 2015)

Research Topics

Judah studied the thermodynamic properties of model lipid bilayers and the accuracy of the CHARMM36 force field to predict the temperature dependence of these properties.

Placement

Israeli Army

Ndubuisi (Ben) Harbor

B.S. Chemical Engineering, UMD (May 2014)

Research Topics

Ben's research involved studies of ethanol and its interaction with model membranes. His focus has been on how ethanol influence structural and dynamical properties of POPC bilayers. Ultimate applications lie in the areas of biofuels and anesthetics.

Placement

University of Toronto (Master's program)

Mengesteab Adera

B.S. Chemical Engineering, UMD (May 2014)

Research Topics

Mengesteab's research has involved studies of a polarizable water model for use in biological and gas hydrate applications. The goal is to have an accurate but efficient water model.

Placement

Schreiber Foods (Production Supervisor)


Boughter

Chris Boughter

B.S. Physics, UMD (May 2015)

Research Topics

Chris' initial interest was in alternate energy and alternate energy sources. This resulted in a project of studying a new class of molecules that form quasi-micelles in collaboration with Dr. Anisimov (UMD/IPST). He switched interest to biophysics and studied the influence of cholesterol on lipid bilayer properties of different lipid headgroup and chain types.

Placement

University of Chicago (Ph.D. Biophysics Program)


Hebert

Jacob Hebert

B.S. Chemical Engineering, UMD (May 2015)

Research Topics

Jacob worked on studies on the temperature dependence of the surface tension of alkane/water interfaces. He also studied the effect of side chains to a model for asphalatenes on aggregation.

Placement

Northeastern University (Ph.D. ChemE Program)


Wong

Sook Wong

B.S. Chemical Engineering, UMD (May 2014)

Research Topics

Sook's research focused on a sugar binding domain of a a bacterial protein that is known to enzymatically attack polysaccharides of its host. She is studying the pH binding dependence of binding of HA to this protein.

Placement

ORISE Research Fellow (FDA)


Konas

Ryan Konas

B.S. Chemical Engineering, UMD (May 2015)

Research Topics

Ryan's research involved studies of ethanol and its interaction with model membranes. His focus was on how ethanol influence structural and dynamical properties of POPE, POPC, POPS and mixed bilayers. Ultimate interest in this work is the effect of toxic products/byproducts to cell membrane during production of biofuels and chemicals for single-celled organisms.

Placement

TBD


Condon

Josh Condon

B.S. Chemical Engineering, UMD (May 2015)

Research Topics

Sook's research focused on a sugar binding domain of a a bacterial protein that is known to enzymatically attack polysaccharides of its host. She is studying the pH binding dependence of binding of poly-Gluc to this protein.

Placement

M.S. program at the University of Delware (Chemical Engineering)


Welch

Connor Welch

B.S. Chemical Engineering, UMD (May 2016)

Research Topics

Connor's research involved studies of gas hydrate formation using a newly developed polarizable water model. However, his main focus was in testing the formation of gel and ripple phase lipid bilayers and worked with Pouyan on the phase diagram of these lipid bilayer structures.

Placement

Deloitte Consulting (Business Technology Analyst)


Bacarisas

Francis Bacarisas

B.S. Bioengineering (May 2016)

Research Topics

Francis tested our newly developed sphingo/ceramide all-atom parameter set. His specific interest was testing ceramide lipid bilayers and mixtures with PC lipids.

Placement

Consulting Firm Job


Ponte

Rui Ponte

B.S. Chemical Engineering and Computer Science (May 2017)

Research Topics

Rui was involved in testing our CHARMM36UA model for various lipids to verify its accuracy and futher use for more complex lipid membrane models.

Placement

Tetracore, Inc.


Clark

Tylar Clark

B.S. Chemistry (May 2018)

Research Topics

Tylar was involved in testing the polarizable Drude force field for lipids in CHARMM.

Placement

Johns Hopkins University (Ph.D. Student in Physical Chemistry) and awarded NSF GRFP in 2019.

Mark Adams

B.S. Chemical Engineering (May 2016)

Research Topics

Mark is involved in testing our CHARMM36UA model for various lipids to verify its accuracy and futher use for more complex lipid membrane models. He also developed models for the ocular lens.

Placement

Stryker Communications(Integration Specialist)


Kang

Hojin Kang

B.S. Computer Science (December 2016)

Research Topics

Hojin tested the accuracy of the CHARMM36 lipid force field for POPG lipid bilayers. She also worked on testing sphingo lipid bilayers mixed with cholesterol. These studies were important with our development of model membranes of the nerve and ocular lens. She also was involved in developing and eductional website for high school and early undergraduates in the general area of molecular biology.

Placement

Facebook (Seattle, WA)


Kang

Lidiya Gavrilenko

B.S. Chemical Engineering (May 2016)

Research Topics

Lidiya continued work by others in the lab on asphalatene aggregration. She studied important functional groups and how these effect aggregration kinetics and structure.

Placement

Federal Aviation Administration (as a general engineer) working for NextGen


Khan

Yusuf Khan

B.S. Chemical Engineering (May 2017)

Research Topics

Yusuf worked on simulation of ceramide bilayers with different hydroxylations to study the effects on bilayer properties.

Placement

Vici Health Sciences


Chu

Monica Chu

B.S. Bioengineering (May 2018)

Research Topics

Monica was involved in understanding how certain antiobotics interact and potentially partition within cell membranes.

Placement

Journey Man Research Fellow (Army Research Lab)


Wildermuth

Ky Wildermuth

B.S. Chemial Engineering with Minor in Physics (May 2017)

Research Topics

Ky was involved in running HMMM MD simulations on the ALPS-like peptide of the Osh4 protein of yeast. The focus here is to enhance timescales of binding to membranes. He also developed a code for quantifying lipid packing defects.

Placement

Planisware USA, Inc.


Fobe

Lenny Fobe

B.S. Chemial Engineering and Chemistry (May 2018)

Research Topics

Lenny was working on two projects involving lipid membranes. His initial project studied the effect of pH buffers on lipid bilayer properties. His second project involved the study of pores forming in ceramide bilayers with applicaitons to skin delivery of drugs.

Placement

U. of Colorado-Boulder (Ph.D. Student in Chemical Engineering)


Mesfin

Nebeyu Mesfin

B.S. Chemial Engineering (expected, May 2019)

Research Topics

Nebeyu studied model membranes of E. coli and how mutations in the membrane composition influence membrane properties. The focus was on understnading how to tune the membrane to be toleratant to fuels/chemicals produced by this bacteria.

Placement

TBD


Moore

Emma Moore

B.S. Bioengineering (expected, May 2020)

Research Topics

Emma studyied the peripherial myelin sheath and developed simulation models to probe its structure and function.

Placement

TBD


Moyer

Lauren Moyer

B.S. Bioengineering (expected, May 2020)

Research Topics

Lauren worked with Linnea on studying antimicrobial peptides and their interaction with cell membranes.

Placement

TBD


Moyer

Kirellos N. Abou Elsaad

B.S. Chemical Engineering (December 2018)

Research Topics

Kirellos studied the formation and growth of cyclohexane/benzene/methane hydrates with molecular simulations.

Placement

TBD


Correa

Juan Correa

B.S. Chemical Engineering (Class of 2021)

Research Topics

Juan studied the formation and growth of cyclohexane/benzene/methane hydrates with molecular simulations.

Placement

TBD


Wang

Eric Wang

B.S. Bioengineering (May 2019)

Research Topics

Eric studyied bilayer and multilayer lipid mixtures of the skin with potential applications in transdermal drug delivery. He was the first to study the long periodicity phase of the stratum corneum and its associated properties (published in JACS in 2019).

Placement

Cambridge University - UK (M.S. Student from the Churchill Scholarship, 2019-20)
Harvard/MIT (Ph.D. student in Medical Engineering, 2020-)


Hiner

Chris Hiner

B.S. Bioengineering (May 2019)

Research Topics

Chris studied the structural and electrostatic characters of the protein CDK5 and its inhibitory peptide, p5.

Placement

Albert Einstein College of Medicine (Ph.D. student in Biomedical Sciences, 2019-)


Kyle P

Kyle Pomykala

B.S. Chemical Engineering (December 2019)

Research Topics

Kyle studyied the applications of Boltzmann-Gibbs entropy to economics, with particular attention paid to economic phase equilibrium e.g. the thermal and superthermal income classes.

Placement

TBD


Linnea W

Linnea Warburton

B.S. Mechanical Engineering (May 2020)

Research Topics

Linnea stuydied an Osh4 peptide and antimicrobial peptides and how they disturb the membrane.

Placement

UC Berkeley (PhD Program in MechE on a NSF GRFP Fellowship, 2020-)


Razi

Niayesh Razi

B.S. Chemistry (Expected 2021)

Research Topics

Niayesh stuydied lipid bilayers and their interaction with drugs. The focus was on antibiotics and how these partition into model lipid membranes.

Placement

TBD


Harron

Marc Harron

B.S. Chemical Engineering (May 2020)

Research Topics

Marc simulated the effects of chemicals produced by microbes and how the lipid membrane can be tunned to improve its tolerance to value-added chemicals produced by these microbes.

Placement

MPR Associates a consulting firm (Engineer)


Roy

Owen Roy

B.S. Bioengineering (Expected 2021)

Research Topics

Owen studied antimicrobial peptides and their interaction with the skin to improve our understanding in the mechanism of peptide translocation.

Placement

TBD


Jacob Olondo Kuba

B.S. in Biology (2020)

Research Topics

Jacob stydied how statin drugs interact with the model membranes and compared with recent experimental measures.

Placement

NIH Postbac (Bethesda, MD)


Hemanth

Varunaa Sri Hemanth Kumar

B.S. Bioengineering (Class of 2022)

Research Topics

Varunaa worked on modeling antimicrobial peptides in model bacterial membranes.

Placement

TBD


Fernandes, J

Josh Fernandes

B.S. Chemical Engineering & Math (May 2021)

Research Topics

Josh studied the ocular lens and developed accurate models for the complex lipid mixture for future studies on proteins involved in childhood cataracts.

Placement

UC Berkeley (PhD Program in ChE, 2021-)


Holoman

Tyla Holoman

B.S. Chemical Engineering (May 2021)

Research Topics

Tyla started in the lab during a summer program when she was in high school. She continued in the lab as an undergraduate researching peptide binding to the skin.

Placement

UT-Austin (PhD Program in ChE, 2021-)


Lin

Crystal Lin

B.S. Chemical Engineering (TBD)

Research Topics

Crystal was co-adivised with Dr. Dongxia Liu and was dong QM studies of reactions at surfaces with density functional theory (DFT).

Placement

WR Grace & Company intern (2021) & Tesla Intern (2021-current)


Lin

Deepika Tripu

B.S. Biochemistry (TBD)

Research Topics

Deepika was working on learning about how metal ions bind to cellular membranes.).

Placement

TBD


Unger

Leonard Unger

B.S. Mathematics & Music Performance (2023, Brown U)

Research Topics

Leonard studied the plasma membrane of the Lyme Bacteria. His focus was modeling the unique glycolipids in this bacteria and accurate membrane models of this bacteria.

Placement

TBD


Yuan

Yiding Yuan

B.S. Bioengineering (May 2023)

Research Topics

Yiding studied cellular membranes with a focus on neurological membrane modeling.

Placement

TBD


Jai

Jai Dadarwala

B.S. Bioengineering (May 2022)

Research Topics

Jai investigated the influence of lipid composition asymmetry on transmembrane proteins of E coli.

Placement

Technomics, Inc.


Teselko

Zach Teselko

Bioengineering (Class of 2024)

Research Topics

Zach researched models for membranes that are targetted by accessory proteins of SARS-CoV-2.

Placement

TBD


Niu

Edward (Yueqi) Niu

Biology (Class of 2022)

Research Topics

Edward studied cellular membranes with a focus on macrophage membrane models.

Placement

Postbac at JHU in Ankrit Sodhi's lab   


Jackson

Erin Jackson

Bioengineering (Class of 2023)

Research Topics

Erin studyied how antibiotics bind to cellular membrane.

Placement

TBD   


Bhat

Pavan Bhat

Bioengineering (Class of 2023)

Research Topics

Pavan researched polyunsaturated lipid membranes and cholesterol placement and organization in these membranes.

Placement

Northwestern joint PhD/JD program in Biomedical Engineering   


Sriya

Sriya Pothapragada

Bioengineering (Class of 2023)

Research Topics

Sriya modelled stereocilia membranes that is of the cilia of the inner ear as part of her honor's thesis.

Placement

Clemson PhD program in Genetics and Biochemistry


Dylan

Dylan Mendes

Bioengineering (Class of 2023)

Research Topics

Dylan worked on how antimicrobial peptides bind to model membranes of the stratum corneum (outer layer of the skin).

Placement

RIVA Solutions (programmer for NOAA Center for Weather and Climate Protection)


Shyam

Shyam Patel

Neuroscience and Computer Science (Class of 2024)

Research Topics

Shyam investigated TLR receptors and sugar binding.

Placement

TBD


Taran

Taran Mahta

Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering (Class of 2023)

Research Topics

Taran simulated the sugar enzyme Smlt1473 with it recently determined crystal structure at varied pH.

Placement

Proctor & Gamble (Georgia)