Group Photo Above: From L to R: Dr. Javier Cabello-Villegas, Brian Hardaway, Kunal Khanna, Dr. Adrien Chauvier, Dr. Alex Johnson-Buck, Dr. Elizabeth Duran, Dr. Surajit Chatterjee, Jieming Li, Dr. Nils Walter, Dr. Tanmay Chatterjee, Dr. Rajeev Yadav, Dr. Nibedita Pal, Ameya Jalihal, Dr. Sujay Ray, Shiba Dandpat, Jenna Veenstra, Dr. Poorna Roy, Kamya Gopal, Hailey Blinkiewicz, Michael Rankin, Karen Montoya
Absent: Alisha Spoelman, Anna Spoto, Damon Hoff, Jacqueline Kunesh, Martina Jerant, Pujan Ajmera
Principal Investigator
Prof. Nils Walter, Ph.D.
Principal Investigator
nwalter@umich.eduHi, I'm Nils Walter, lucky to be the mentor and coach of a young, dynamic, and interactive group, where my main job is to help everyone excel in their research. Over the years we have developed and applied many leading-edge single molecule microscopy tools to understand the mechanisms of RNA biology, from RNA enzymes and riboswitches to the spliceosome and RNA silencing machinery. We also work on CRISPR and DNA nanotechnology, and have developed a molecular diagnostics tools that can reliably detect single biomarkers of disease (leading to foundation of a biotech company!). Students and postdocs in my group get both a broad and a deep education with skills that translate into the real world, from academia to industry. I have an "open-door" policy, so please stop by if you have a questions, or seek us out on Twitter!
Curriculum Vitae
Office : 734-615-2060
Research Asst Professor
Dr. Alexander (Alex) Johnson-Buck
alebuck@umich.eduAlex received his B.A. with a double major in Chemistry and French from Northern Michigan University, and his Ph.D. in Chemistry from the University of Michigan, where his thesis focused on the study of engineered molecular dynamics in DNA nanotechnology at the single-molecule level. After a postdoctoral fellowship at the Dana Farber Cancer Institute/Harvard Medical School, he returned to Michigan as a Research Assistant Professor. His research interests center on the application of single-molecule kinetic engineering to a variety of problems in nanotechnology and medicine, including pushing the limits of specificity in molecular recognition for improved diagnostics. (Member since 2016)
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Postdoctoral Fellows
Dr. Javier Cabello-Villegas
Postdoctoral Fellow
cabelloj@umich.eduJavier received his undergraduate degree (licenciatura) in Basic Biomedical Research from the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM), and his Ph.D. in Biochemistry and Cell Biology from Rice University. Javier has done doctoral, post-doctoral, and industry work on the structure and function of RNAs and proteins using NMR spectroscopy as a primary tool. In his current work he studies riboswitch ligand binding and function through single molecule fluorescence microscopy and biochemical techniques. (Member since 2016)
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Dr. Surajit Chatterjee
Postdoctoral Fellow
surajitc@umich.eduSurajit completed his Ph.D. in Chemistry from Indian Institute of Technology Indore, India. His thesis work primarily focused on the study of the photoluminescence properties of silicon quantum dot and its effectiveness as a single-particle luminescence marker. He joined the Walter Lab as a postdoc in December 2016 and studies how the riboswitches regulate gene expression upon their interaction with various small-molecule ligands, proteins, ribosomes etc. (Member since 2016)
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Dr. Tanmay Chatterjee
tanmayc@umich.eduTanmay received his M.Sc. from University of Burdwan and Ph.D. from Indian Institute of Science Education and Research, Kolkata (IISER KOLKATA). He joined the Walter lab as a postdoc in May, 2017. His current research focus is on ultra sensitive protein detection by Single- Molecule Recognition through Equilibrium Poisson Sampling (SiMREPS) method. (Member since 2017)
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Dr. Adrien Chauvier
Postdoctoral Fellow
achauvie@umich.eduAdrien obtained his B.Sc and M.Sc. in Microbiology Agrobioscience from the University Paul Sabatier in Toulouse, France. During his PhD, he worked on riboswitch regulation with Daniel Lafontaine at the University of Sherbrooke, Quebec, Canada. In the Walter lab, Adrien is applying biochemical and single molecule techniques to understand how Non-coding RNAs modulate the dynamic of the transcription machinery. (Member Since 2017)
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Dr. Elizabeth Duran
Postdoctoral Fellow
elizabcd@umich.eduElizabeth received her B.A. in Chemistry from Florida International University and then completed her Ph.D. in Chemistry in the lab of Aaron Lucius at the University of Alabama at Birmingham. During her graduate work she used hydrodynamic techniques to elucidate the ATP-linked assembly mechanism of a AAA+ molecular motor involved in bacterial protein quality control pathways. In her current work, she’s using single molecule approaches to investigate the mechanism of DEAH-box helicases critical to the function of the yeast spliceosome. Elizabeth’s work is currently supported through a postdoctoral fellowship from the Michigan IRACDA program. (Member Since: 2018)
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Dr. Zi Li
Postdoctoral Fellow
lzi@umich.eduZi received her B.S. in Material Chemistry from Ocean University of China and Ph.D. in Analytical Chemistry from Kansas State University under the guidance of Prof. Daniel Higgins. Her Ph.D. work focused primarily on studying DNA-surface interactions on organosilane graded surfaces using single-molecule fluorescence techniques. Currently, her work is focusing on developing ultra-sensitive cancer biomarker detection assays via recently invented SiMREPS approach using FRET microscopy in Walter lab. (Member since 2019)
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Dr. Shankar Mandal
Postdoctoral Fellow
mandal@umich.eduShankar received his B.S. in Chemistry and M.S in Organic Chemistry from the University of Dhaka, Bangladesh. He received his PhD, in Chemistry and Biochemistry, under the supervision of Hanbin Mao at Kent State University, Ohio. During his PhD, he used single molecule force spectroscopy (laser tweezers) to develop single molecule mechanochemical biosensors. As a postdoctoral researcher in the Walter's laboratory, he is utilizing single molecule fluorescence microscopy to develop sensitive, highly specific, and multiplexed biosensors for detecting nucleic acid molecules as potential disease biomarkers in complex biosamples. (Member Since:2019)
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Dr. Andreas Schmidt
Postdoctoral Fellow
andsch@umich.eduMember Since: 2019
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Dr. Catie Scull
Postdoctoral Fellow
cescull@umich.eduCatie obtained her B.S. in Cell, Molecular, and Microbial Biology from Auburn University, and then completed her Ph.D. in Biochemistry and Molecular Genetics in the lab of David Schneider at the University of Alabama at Birmingham. Her graduate research focused on the kinetics of transcription elongation by eukaryotic RNA polymerase I. She joined the Walter lab in 2020, and is now focused on understanding the co-transcriptional folding of riboswitch RNA. (Member since 2020)
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Dr. Robb Welty
Postdoctoral Fellow
robbw@umich.eduRobb received his B.S. in Chemistry & Molecular Biology and M.S. in Chemistry from the University of Minnesota Duluth. He received his PhD, in Computational and Molecular Biophysics, under the mentorship of Kathleen Hall at Washington University in St. Louis. Where his thesis work focused on the kinetics of ion and protein induced RNA folding and allostery. In the Walter lab, Robb is studying how sequence encoded RNA structure plays a role in alternative gene splicing in disease. (Member Since: 2018)
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Graduate Students
Liuhan Dai
Graduate Student
liuhand@umich.eduLiuhan received his B.S. in Chemical Biology from Nankai University, China and becomes a Ph.D. student in Chemistry/Chemical Biology in University of Michigan. During his undergraduate studies, he explored both methodology development of fluorine chemistry in Pingping Tang's lab and detection by single molecule kinetic fingerprinting (SMKF) in Nils Walter's lab as a visiting researcher. Currently, he is developing a detection method for epigenetic biomarkers of cancer with SMKF. Multidisciplinary convergence is always a fun nature in his research. (Member since 2017)
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Emily Ellinger
Graduate Student
eellinge@umich.eduEmily received her B.S. in Biochemistry from the University of Indiana in 2019. She is currently obtaining her Ph.D. at the University of Michigan in the Department of Biological Chemistry. Her current research in Nils Walter's lab focuses on using biochemical techniques to study riboswitches and transcription machinery. (Member since 2020)
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Guoming Gao
Graduate Student
gmgao@umich.eduGuoming received his B.S. in Biology from Wuhan University, Wuhan, China. He stepped into the Single Molecule Biophysics field by studying chaperone-assisted R-loop formation in Xinghua Zhang's lab at Wuhan University. Further exploration in biophysics, including MD simulation in Niu Huang's Lab at NIBS, Beijing, and X-Ray Crystallography in Xuewu Zhang's Lab at UTSW Medical Center, Dallas, led to his decision on joining the Biophysics Ph.D. program through PIBS in 2018. Currently, his research focuses on probing the role of RNAs in membraneless organelles with live-cell single molecule RNA tracking. (Member since 2018)
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Ameya Jalihal
Cellular and Molecular Biology Graduate Student
ameyapj@umich.eduAmeya got his B.Tech in Biotechnology from SASTRA University, Thanjavur, India. After working in the labs of Dr. Kavita Babu in IISER Mohali, India, Dr. Oleg Igoshin Rice University Houston, and Dr. Christian Ray University of Kansas, he joined the Cell and Molecular Biology PhD program in 2015. His has continued to study spatio-temporal dynamics in biological regulation in his work in the Walter lab, where he uses single-molecule tools to study macromolecular complex formation and higher-order organization of RNA-protein complexes in living cells. (Member since 2016)
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Kunal Khanna
Chemistry Graduate Student
khannak@umich.eduKunal received his B.A. in Biochemistry from Hunter College. He studied optimizing synthesis of various organic compounds as an undergraduate and worked as a lab technician in the Alarcon lab at SUNY Downstate which studied how learning and acquisition of memory in mice changed the mouse hippocampus at the levels of neural circuits. He then joined the Chemistry PhD program at University of Michigan and is currently working in the Walter Lab on developing a FRET-based approach to SiMREPS for detecting a variety of miRNA targets. (Member since 2017)
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Rosa Romero
Graduate Student
roromero@umich.eduRosa received a Bachelor's in Biochemistry from California State University of San Marcos, then joined the Ph.D. program in Biological Chemistry at the University of Michigan. During undergrad, she worked in Dr. Kambiz Hammadani laboratory where she worked on developing a method to enhance fluorescence quantum yield determination using Fluorescence Correlation Spectroscopy (FCS). Her current research involves understanding how riboswitches control gene expression using single-molecule approaches. (Member Since: 2019) Learn more..
Masters Students
Rotation Students
Brad Clegg
Rotation Student
bdclegg@umich.eduBrad received his B.A. in Biochemistry with a minor in Mathematics from Kenyon College in 2020. He is currently a first-year Ph.D. student in the Program in Chemical Biology at the University of Michigan. He previously has done summer research at both Eastern Michigan University and the University of Michigan in platinum-peptide conjugates and neuropharmacology, respectively. (Member since 2020)
Undergraduate Students
Pujan Ajmera
Undergraduate student
pujan@umich.eduPujan is an undergraduate student planning to graduate in 2022 with a B.S. in engineering physics, minoring in biophysics and music. He is currently working with Dr. Chauvier on understanding the structure and dynamics of the crcB fluoride riboswitch and transcriptional machinery using single molecule FRET. (Member since 2018)
Carolyn Glasser
Undergraduate Student
caglass@umich.eduCarolyn is an undergraduate student planning on graduating in 2023 with a BS in biochemistry. She is currently working with Andreas to establish a single-molecule m6A detection assay using TIRF microscopy. (Member since 2019)
Michael James
Undergraduate Student
jamesem@umich.eduMichael is an undergraduate student slated for graduation in 2021 with a B.S. in Biochemistry. He is currently researching under the mentorship of Dr. Robb Welty in order to better characterize the relationship between pre-MRNA conformational dynamics and the assembly of the spliceosome in the metazoan cell nucleus. In order to achieve this goal, Michael is now employing the use of single-molecule Fluorescence Resonance Energy Transfer (sm-FRET), a biophysical technique that can be methodically applied to quantify the behavior of such pre-MRNA structural ensembles. (Member since 2020)
Jacqueline Kunesh
Undergraduate student
jkunesh@umich.eduJacqueline is an undergraduate student planning on graduating in Winter 2020 with a BS in biochemistry. She is currently working with Surajit Chatterjee to study how transcriptional machinery interacts with the ribosome in the elongation complex. (Member since 2018)
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Anna Spoto
Undergraduate Student
spotoann@umich.eduAnna graduated from the University of Michigan in 2019 with my bachelor's in biochemistry and is currently participating in the Accelerated Masters Degree Program in the Chemistry Department at the University of Michigan. She is working with other lab members to study single molecule detection using SiMREPS. (Member since 2017)
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Anastasiya Trzcinski
Undergraduate Student
atrzcins@umich.eduAnna is an undergraduate student planning on graduating in 2021 with a BS in biochemistry. Right now she is working with Elizabeth Duran to characterize one of the steps in the splice cycle by analyzing the protein factor Prp16. (Member since 2018)
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Visiting Researchers
Lidan Li
Visiting Researcher
lidanli@umich.eduLidan received her B.S. in Pharmaceutical Engineering from Beijing University of Chemical Technology, Beijing, China. She joined the Chemical Engineering and Technology Ph.D. program in 2015 under the guidance of Prof. Changyuan Yu in BUCT. Her work focused primarily on enzyme operated DNA nanotechnology in detection and imaging methods. She joined Walter Lab as a visiting student and is currently working on FRET-based approach to SiMREPS for detecting miRNA in single cell. (Member since 2019)
SMART Center Staff
Dr. Damon Hoff
SMART Center Manager
hoffj@umich.eduJ. Damon Hoff manages the Center for Single Molecule Analysis in Real-Time (SMART Center), a shared use facility housed in the Dept. of Biophysics at the University of Michigan that offers a suite of single-molecule microscopes and analysis tools. He obtained his B.S.E. in Biomedical and Electrical Engineering from Duke University, and continued his studies at the University of Michigan, obtaining his Ph.D. in Biomedical Engineering, developing optical tools for manipulation of biomolecules, including nanoscale ultrafast laser ablation and optical tweezers. He now manages the day-to-day activities at the SMART Center and facilitates user training, experimental planning, and analysis. (Member since 2013, SMART center phone: 734-763-5449)
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Research Associate
Martina Jerant, MPH
Research Associate
mjerant@umich.eduMartina completed her undergraduate degree in Biology from Brown University and received her Master’s in Public Health from Columbia University. Martina Jerant serves as the Walter Lab manager as well as the manager for the Center for RNA Biomedicine at the University of Michigan. Using collaborative tools like Strategic Doing and Grant Sprints, Martina leads diverse groups of students, faculty, and researchers to collaboratively work across disciplines, build community and generate innovative ideas to advance RNA research and education across the University of Michigan. (Member since 2016) Office: 734-615-8213
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