Author: Susan Hunt

Congratulations to MIT senior Emily Damato, who won the “Audience Choice Award” at the April 26 SuperUROP poster session, with her poster “Applications of Machine Learning for Cryo-EM.”   Emily has been part of the Drennan lab for two years, this past year as a SuperUROP.  Her mentor in the lab, Ed Brignole, who now heads… Continue reading Congratulations to Emily Damato!

Congratulations to postdoc Mary Andorfer on her prizewinning poster “Taming radical enzymes through directed evolution and structural analysis.”  Mary’s poster received Third Place in the Postdoc Category for Best Poster at the April 10 Annual Poster Session of MIT’s Center for Environmental Health Sciences (CEHS) and Superfund Research Program (SRP).

A warm welcome to postdoc Emily Ulrich, who joined the Drennan lab on April 2.  Emily will receive her PhD this May from the University of Illinois.  Her thesis, written under the direction of Wilfred van der Donk, is entitled “Diverse Enzyme Reactions in Phosphonate Natural Product Biosynthesis.”    

Congratulations to Percival Yang-Ting Chen on his first author PNAS paper!  Read it online at PNAS.

MIT celebrated exceptional undergraduate teaching, and honored a new group of MacVicar Faculty Fellows, with a symposium on March 9 titled “Inclusive Pedagogies: Building a Vibrant Community of Learners at MIT.”  Cathy, a 2015 MacVicar Faculty Fellow, kicked off the symposium, speaking about stereotype threat.  Read the MIT News feature.

Congrats to Dr. Tsehai Grell and Dr. David Born on successfully defending their respective PhD dissertations!

Cathy (third from the right, with cast members) was the featured guest at ImprovBoston’s Spotlight Series on March 1. To a sold-out house, Cathy and the cast performed im- provised skits, working off a short on-stage interview with her.  This was Cathy’s second appearance with ImprovBoston. ImprovBoston’s Spotlight Series shines a light on Boston-area professionals… Continue reading Cathy featured at ImprovBoston

As reported in MIT News, Drennan lab research has contributed to the discovery of the structure of an important enzyme.  The results were published February 20 in the journal eLife.  Read more in the MIT News article.   

Congratulations to David Born on his first author Science paper.  See MIT News Story.

December’s Molecule of the Month is PhaC, which bacteria use to build biodegradable plastic, chosen by RCSB Protein Data Bank (PDB).            

Research scientist Ed Brignole has been appointed to direct the cryogenic electron microscopy (Cryo-EM) facility at MIT.  Ed is excited about developing this research capability that will be housed in the nearly completed MIT.nano building. He looks forward to engaging broadly with scientists and engineers at MIT and continuing to work closely with the Drennan… Continue reading Congratulations to Ed Brignole

The Drennan lab welcomes Mary Andorfer.  Mary got her PhD in August 2017 from the University of Chicago; her thesis, written under the direction of Professor Jared Lewis, examined the use of halogenases as tunable catalysts for synthetic organic chemistry. Welcome Mary!    

MIT’s OpenCourseWare (OCW) has published Cathy’s 5.111SC Principles of Chemical Science.  The course website includes a number of special features such as lecture notes, instructor insights, and a link to Behind the Scenes at MIT, a collection of short videos of MIT researchers talking about their research as well as their personal stories.  Read more… Continue reading Principles of Chemical Science published on MIT’s OpenCourseWare

MIT undergraduate Emily Damato has been chosen as an MIT EECS-Lincoln Laboratory Undergraduate Research and Innovation Scholar, receiving funding through the prestigious EECS Research and Innovation Scholars Program.  Emily will work in the Drennan lab as a SuperUROP on her project  Automating Electron Microscope (EM) Particle Reconstruction with Machine Learning, under the mentorship of Ed… Continue reading Congratulations to Emily Damato

Nominated by the Chemistry Department, Tsehai Grell was selected to be featured on MIT’s home page.  In her profile she speaks about growing up in the Commonwealth of Dominica, her research in the Drennan lab, and her commitment to making MIT more inclusive for graduate students.       

Five undergraduates are spending the summer of 2017 in the Drennan lab.  Newcomers are MSRP Bio student Gisele Andree, a rising junior at UMass Amherst majoring in Chemistry and Biochemistry; HHMI EXROP student Luis Caldera Guzman, about to begin his senior year at UC Berkeley, where he majors in Bioengineering, and Materials Science & Engineering;… Continue reading Drennan Lab welcomes five undergraduates for summer 2017