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Latest News
07.31.25 Summer REU program comes to an end So long to our summer research experience for undergraduates (REU) student Allison Szalay! Allison is a rising senior at Gustavus Adolphus College in Minnesota and worked with Mohamed on all things hyaluronan this summer. She gained experience in nanopore analysis and ELISAs and performed at a very high level. Thank you for all of your hard work!
06.18.25 Newest nanopore paper accepted in Analyst Our latest manuscript on selective detection with solid-state nanopores was accepted today in Analyst. The paper by co-authors Mohamed and group alum Komal describes the quantitation of internal sequence motifs from DNA and RNA extracted from human plasma, demonstrating the translational potential of the approach. In addition, we extend the protocol for the first time to double-strand DNA genomes, enabling application of the measurement to human genomic analysis. Congrats Mohamed and Komal!
06.10.25 New paper accepted in the Journal of Radiation Research and Applied Sciences Congratulations to Dariya on the acceptance of her new paper entitled "Quantitative assessment of damage and radioprotection in primary human bronchial epithelial cells exposed to distinct ionizing radiation types"! The paper describes the effects of both Gamma and X-Ray radiation on bronchial cells as well as the assessment of a radioprotectant drug. This is in collaboration with our WFIRM collaborator Dr. Sean Murphy.
06.10.25 Presentations at ISHAS meeting The group was well-represented at the bi-annual meeting of the International Society for Hyaluronic Acid Sciences in St. Charles, IL with Suruchi presenting a poster and Adam giving an oral presentation. Both were well received and generated a lot of great discussion and potential collaborations! The HA community is always a fun crowd and we both had a blast seeing the extraordinary range of topics involving HA.
05.17.25 2025 Wake Forest Hooding Ceremony We were thrilled to have three new PhDs from our lab take part in the Hooding ceremony this spring! Recently-defended Dorothea and Ian were joined by Sara who defended late last year. Adam was happy to be able to welcome them on stage to receive their commencement hood and officially mark the end of a long journey. The biggest of congratulations to them and to their families and loved ones who helped them throughout their PhDs. It's never easy.
04.22.25 Ian defends! It's been a busy month in the lab and it is topped of with Ian Wadsworth defending his dissertation titled "microRNA Biomarker Detection and Quantification by Solid-state Nanopore Resistive Pulse Sensing"! Ian did exceptional work on this project, including learning and innovating in the area of protein expression and production to make a new monovalent streptavidin pipeline. He did a great job. Congratulations, Dr. Wadsworth!
04.15.25 Vivien Coulson-Thomas visit The lab welcomes our HA friend and colleague Dr. Vivien Coulson-Thomas from the College of Optometry at the University of Houston. Along with her postdoc Dr. Sudhir Verma, she spent a couple of days with us learning about our HA extraction and analysis protocols. We were also lucky enough to have her present on her research in a seminar titled "Hyaluronan regulates homeostasis and pathogenesis of the ocular surface".
04.10.25 Dorothea defends! Today, Dorothea Erxleben successfully defended her dissertation titled "Translational application of solid-state nanopore sensing to analysis of hyaluronan and its heavy-chain modification"! She did an outstanding job both in performing her research and in presenting it and passed with flying colors. Her dissertation contains a wealth of knowledge and new findings, some of which we hope to publish soon. Congratulations, Dr. Erxleben!
04.4.25 Welcome Lauren Washco! We are pleased to welcome our newest PhD student, Lauren Washco! Lauren is a familiar face in the lab since she joined us last summer as an undergraduate researcher and also completed a rotation in the lab late last year. We must not have scared her off too bad because she is now officially a graduate student in Molecular Medicine with Adam as her advisor. She will be focusing on nucleic acid biomarker analyses, some incorporating nanopore detection. Welcome!
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