The world’s growing population faces looming food shortages and the pressing need for cheap and sustainable energy sources. Reliable conversion of sunlight–our most abundant energy source–into fuel can address these threats. However, reliable energy conversion requires knowing how to tailor, at an atomic level, photoprotection cycles limiting food production and energy flow in solar cells … Continued
Metal-containing enzymes (metalloenzymes) hold tremendous promise for sustainable chemistry because they perform challenging reactions under mild conditions. However, known metalloenzymes are limited in substrate scope or have complicated structures that are recalcitrant to engineering, which poses a major constraint on biocatalyst development. Excitingly, microbial genomes harbor a wealth of unexplored enzymes that can serve as … Continued
We aim to redefine cellular classification by prioritizing molecular activity over molecular abundance, positing that chemical activity serves as a unique fingerprint of cellular identity. This new approach overcomes the limitations of traditional transcriptomic and proteomic methods that cannot differentiate between active and inactive molecular states. We plan to develop a scalable DNA-encoded chemistry platform … Continued
Carbon dioxide capture from the point of generation or the ambient environment is broadly recognized to play a key role in climate change mitigation. However, the incumbent methods are energy-intensive and fossil fuel-dependent. My research program aims to revolutionize the technological landscape for carbon capture by developing an entirely new mechanistic platform powered by renewable … Continued
Aerosols have an outsized influence on climate through their interactions with light and clouds. Solar radiation management (SRM) strategies propose to intentionally inject these tiny nanometer-scale particles into the atmosphere to increase Earth’s albedo and induce global cooling, as has been observed following major volcanic activity. While the ethics of SRM remain a topic of … Continued
Biocatalysis holds the potential to revolutionize the sustainable production of biofuels, chemicals, and medicine. However, current biocatalysis research is limited to the engineering of enzyme functions known in biochemistry or organic chemistry. By combining our expertise in synthetic biology and synthetic chemistry, we are developing new strategies to discover and evolve novel modes of biocatalysis … Continued
Catalysis plays a crucial role in chemical discovery and production to meet societal needs across sectors (biomedical, agricultural, energy, etc.) However, despite the modularity involved in catalytic assembly of simpler building blocks under mild conditions, dominant methodologies rely heavily on unsustainable use of precious metals and generate stoichiometric waste from pre-activated reagents. My research team … Continued
Spatiotemporal regulation of the cellular RNAs is crucial for proper protein production and cellular function. However, the intricate subcellular dynamics and regulatory mechanisms of RNA life cycle remain largely obscured due to the limitations of existing analytical methods. Thus I aim to create a panoramic map of the RNA life cycle at genome-wide scale through … Continued
For decades, petroleum-derived hydrocarbons have served as the primary energy source and central feedstock for the chemical industry. Today, this petroleum-centered paradigm is no longer sustainable. My research program aims to develop a new generation of porous materials that are compatible with alternative raw materials and renewable energy sources. First, drawing inspiration from nature, my … Continued
Directed evolution has yielded myriad molecules to transform biotechnology and industrial processes. Biomolecule discovery required to fuel therapeutics, however, lies beyond the scope of in vitro and prokaryotic directed evolution, which frequently results in products that fail to function properly in mammalian systems. Motivated by the ever-growing demand for biomolecules tailored to probe and perturb … Continued