People

Principal Investigator

Prof. Michelle A. O’Malley
Professor, Department of Chemical Engineering, UCSB

USDA-NIFA Postdoctoral Fellow, MIT/Broad Institute (2009-2012)
Ph.D. Chemical Engineering, University of Delaware (2009)
B.S. Chemical Engineering; B.S. Biomedical Engineering,
Carnegie Mellon University (2004)
[CV]
Email

Postdoctoral Researchers and Project Scientists

Dr. Susanna Seppala
Project Scientist
Ph.D. Biochemistry, Stockholm University, Sweden (2012)
M.Sc. Molecular Biology, Stockholm University, Sweden (2005)
Membrane Protein Biogenesis
Email
CV

---

Dr. Xuefeng (Nick) Peng 
​Ph.D. Geosciences, Princeton University (2015)
Genomic and metabolic characterization of anaerobic consortia
Email
​(co-advised with Dr. Dave Valentine)

---

Dr. Chris Lawson
Ph.D. Environmental Engineering (Minor: Microbiology), University of Wisconsin-Madison (2019)
Engineering anaerobic microbiomes for biofuels and bioproducts
Email
CV

---

Graduate Students

Candice Swift
B.S. Chemical and Biological Engineering
University of Wisconsin-Madison  (2010)
​NSF Graduate Fellow
​Email

Igor Podolsky
B.S. Chemical Engineering, North Carolina State University (2015)
Email

Khanh (Kendrick) D. Nguyen
B. S. Chemistry, University of New Orleans (2016)
Biophysical study of G protein-coupled receptor
​Email
CV
​Co-advised by Songi Han

Tom Lankiewicz
B.A. Biology, Grinnell College (2012)
M.S. Marine Studies, University of Delaware (2014)
Characterizing lignin-active enzymes in anaerobic fungi​
Email
CV

Patrick Leggieri
B. S. Chemical Engineering, Lafayette College (2018)
Metabolic and systems modeling of anaerobic consortia
Email

Stephen Lillington
B. S. Chemical Engineering, Northwestern University (2018)
Characterization and engineering of cellulosomes from anaerobic fungi
Email
​​Co-advised by Scott Shell

Elaina Blair
B.S. Chemical Engineering, Brigham Young University (2019)
​Email

St. Elmo Wilken
M. Eng. Control Engineering, University of Pretoria (2015)
Email
CV
​Co-advised by Linda Petzold

Jennifer Brown
B.S. Chemical Engineering, University of Toledo (2015) 
Engineering stable anaerobic consortia
Email
​

Michael Vigers
B.S. Chemical and Biological Engineering, Montana State University - Bozeman (2016)
Email
​Co-advised by Songi Han

Kellie Heom
B. S. Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology (2018)
​Developing single-cell RNA sequencing techniques for
​bacteria  
Email
​​Co-advised by Siddarth Dey

Emily Sun
B. S. Chemical Engineering, UC Berkeley (2017)
Email
Co-advised by Arnab Mukherjee

Katharine Dickson
B.S. Biology, George Mason University (2014)
Anaerobic fungi and native consortia in nonhuman primate digestive systems
Email

Lazarina Butkovich
B.S. Chemical Engineering, California Institute of Technology (2019)
Email

International Visitor

Dr. Mike Theodorou
Professor of Anaerobic Digestion & Fermentation Technology
Harper Adams University, UK

Ph.D. Biochemical Plant Pathology, Imperial College London
Email 

Current Undergraduate Students

Nikola Malinov 
UCSB Chemical Engineering 2021

---

Freda Lababidi
UCSB Chemical Engineering 2021

---

Corey Kerdman-Andrade
UCSB Chemical Engineering 2021

---

Derek Tang
​UCSB Microbiology 2020

---

Lab Alumni

Former Postdoctoral Scholars

Dr. Doriv Knop (2016-2018)
Dr. Monica Reith (2014-2016), currently Assistant Professor, Southern Illinois University (Edwardsville)
Dr. Jessica Sexton (2014-2016), currently Apeel Sciences
Dr. Charles Haitjema (2012-2016), currently ProteinSimple
Dr. Kevin Solomon (2012-2015), currently Assistant Professor, Purdue University

Former PhD Students

Dr. Justin Yoo, currently Bluebird Bio
Dr. Sean Gimore, currently Ascus Biosciences
Dr. John Henske, currently Finch Therapeutics
Dr. Nicole Schonenbach, currently Pfizer
Dr. Jennifer Guerrero, currently Amgen

Former Undergraduates

Jenna Hoover (2018-2019), currently Amgen
Mason Gatz (2019), undergraduate UCSD Chemical Engineering
Alex Smith (2018-2019), undergraduate UCSB Microbiology
Samantha Lee (2015-2018)
Julia Bryne (2016-2018)
Zach Cogan (2015-2017), currently UCSF
Winston Hsu (2016-2017), currently OSIsoft
Randall DeGroot (2015-2017), currently Zymergen
​Jessica Hauk (2015-2017), currently Chemetry
Francis Cunningham (2016-2017), currently PhD Student Chemical & Bimolecular Engineering, UC-Berkeley
R. Andres Parra Sperberg (2014-2016), currently PhD Student Bioengineering, Stanford University
Herman Ching (2015-2016), currently PhD Student Chemical Engineering, UC-Irvine
Daniel Yur (2014-2016), currently PhD Student Chemical & Biomolecular Eng, University of Delaware
Wen-Kang Chou, ICB URAP (2014-2015), currently PhD student ChE, Princeton
Sarah Maxel (2013-2015), currently PhD Student Chemical Engineering, UC-Irvine
​Natalie Banakis (2012-2015), currently Patagonia
Charlotte Abrahamson (2013-2015), currently PhD Student Chemical & Biomolecular Eng, Northwestern
Erich Brodbeck, Amgen Fellow, ICB URAP (2013-2014), currently Amryis
Chris Euchus (UC-Irvine), INSET (2014)
Marla Nyamdori (2013-2014)
David Chau (2013-2014), currently Eurofins Advantar Labs
Kane Nania (UCLA) (2013), currently PhD student UCLA
Jiehao (CJ) Chen (UC-Berkeley), INSET (2013), currently Genentech
Jessica O'Day (2012-2013), currently Kite Pharma
​Brian Owens (2012-2013), currently Energy Transfer
Briane Kiliman, McNair Scholar (2012-2013), currently Intel
Meredith Green (2012-2013), currently Merck
Elisa Ovadia (2012-2013), currently PhD Student Chemical & Biomolecular Eng, University of Delaware
Josie Tressl (2012-2013), currently Boehrigner Ingelheim