Spring 2024
We have been busy bees this year; three more manuscripts are published and two very interesting manuscripts in preparation.
Three undergraduates are currently working in the lab in various projects under great mentoring from our entire team. Go Bulls!
Three undergraduates are currently working in the lab in various projects under great mentoring from our entire team. Go Bulls!
We are fortunate and thankful to our experimental collaborators, their expertise and perspective have definitely motivate and challenge our work for the better!
Ekin Atilla-Gokcumen (Univ. at Buffalo)
Cecilia Leal (Univ. of Illinois Urbana-Champaign)
Francisco J. Sierra-Valdes (Tecnologico de Monterrey)
Søren Bak (Univ. of Copenhagen)
Horacio Guzman (Univ. Autonoma de Madrid)
Ekin Atilla-Gokcumen (Univ. at Buffalo)
Cecilia Leal (Univ. of Illinois Urbana-Champaign)
Francisco J. Sierra-Valdes (Tecnologico de Monterrey)
Søren Bak (Univ. of Copenhagen)
Horacio Guzman (Univ. Autonoma de Madrid)
Toyin, Jinhui, Ricardo, and Seth headed to Philly this past February to present their work at the Biophysical Society Meeting. Congrats all!!
Congrats Jinhui on your latest collaborative publication on lipid membrane thermodynamics during inflammation processes.
Congrats Ricardo on your contribution to the publication on protein acylation and membrane dynamics during mechanisms of cell death.
Fall 2023
Our group keeps thriving! Two additional manuscripts were recently accepted & are now available online, lab members are presenting their work at national conferences & also receive due recognition to their efforts and contributions to our field.
Congratulations Jinhui on your latest Review, published in a special issue on naturally derived antibiotics.
Toyin lead the effort on a beginner-friendly MD protocol for simulating complex lipid bilayers for a special issue on membranes in the Journal of Visual Experiments. Angela and Van, two undergraduate researchers in out team, also contributed to this work. We had so much fun during the video production associated with the manuscript - link soon to come!
Congrats Toyin on receiving the 2023-2024 Graduate Women in Science National Fellowship!! We are currently recruiting a UB undergrad to participate in this project during Spring 2024. She also presented a talk at the NOBCChE National Conference in September.
Toyin at NOBCChE 2023
Saponin-based antibiotics - Review article
JoVE video production - link coming soon!
Spring 2023
New publication is out! Congrats Jinhui on the latest studies on saponin molecules and their interaction with lipid bilayers.
We welcomed two undergraduate students to the team. Van Le and Seth Thomson have been making excellent progress in membrane-only simulations. They are ready to extend their projects during the summer!
Congrats to Shane and Angela, team members who will be joining the ChemE REU program at the University of Florida this coming summer. Looking forward to hearing their experience!
January 2023
Congratulations Ricardo & Toyin on their most recent publication in a special issue of Frontiers in Chemistry:
"Modeling the molecular fingerprint of protein-lipid interactions of MLKL on complex bilayers"
Great ongoing collaboration with the Atilla lab at UB Department of Chemistry
Fall 2022
Our team is on fire! : )
Jinhui & Ricardo pass their QE2 exam. We have now three PhD Candidates in the lab!!!
Toyin has her first review article on protein-driven membrane remodeling published in the Biophysical Journal. Congrats!
Latest conferences (June-Sept 2022)
Toyin attended the NOBCChE conference and presented her first research poster! Her team at the conference also won first place in a team-building activity during the week activities :)
Dr. Monje attended the Biomembranes conference to present work from the lab; and the ASEE / AIChE summer faculty school in Golden Colorado.
Shane & Jocelin presented their research during Undergraduate Research Day at UB and at the end of their LSAMP fellowship in early August. After three years, this year's LSAMP program was fully in-person.
Toyin @ NOBCChE
Biomembranes Conference, Santa Fe, NM
ASEE / AIChE Faculty Summer School
S. Varner presenting his work on modeling GM3 lipids
J. Mendez with her poster on viral protein structural studies
LSAMP Fellows - UB Summer 2022 Cohort
August 2022.
We've been busy this summer! Here are the highlights of our work, gatherings, and group meetings.
July 2022
Touring the Center for Computational Research (CCR) w/ this year's LSAMP scholars. This is where our 'magic' happens!
May 2022
Congrats Laura on completing your Masters in Engineering degree! We wish you the best as you move to a position at Regeneron.
May 2022.
Gearing up for a new summer season working with talented undergraduate LSAMP Scholars.
Welcome Jocelin, Shane, and Angela!
April 2022.
WiSE-sponsored lab tour of our group. Q&A with graduate members of the lab, and poster presentations about on-going work.
Exciting to see undergraduate students interested in joining our team!
Toyin wins 1st runner up prize at the STEM for Every one event at UB, sponsored by WiSE. Her poster introduced to the audience MD simulations and some systems she is currently studying to understand protein-lipid interactions.
March 2022.
First publication from our lab is out!!! Molecular insights into the interactions of small molecules and lipid membrane models to inspire novel therapies for cancer treatments.
Congratulations Jinhui on making it to one of the ACS Omega covers in this issue; keep up the great work!
February 2022.
Jinhui & Prof. Monje-Galvan present posters at the 66th Biophysical Society Meeting in San Francisco, CA. First in-person conference for the lab!
We resumed our group meetings for the Spring semester. Ricardo share a very interesting presentation on machine learning approaches to analyze large data sets.
December 2021.
Laura is the first graduate from the Monje Group! She completed her ME degree in Chemical and Biological Engineering with her research credits on molecular dynamics simulations of membrane models. She is moving to a researcher position at Regeneron Pharmaceuticals, Inc. We wish her the best as she moves onto the next phase of her goals!!
Toyin passes her 2nd qualifying exam (research proposal) with excellent comments and feedback; congratulations!!
Jinhui & Prof. Monje-Galvan present posters at Cell Bio Virtual 2021, ASCB annual meeting.
November 2021.
We had the opportunity to visit the Center for Computational Research in downtown campus and learn more about the infrastructure of the computer room, and some resources available for researchers.
w/ the center director
In front of our nodes!
September 2021.
Fall semester starts and we have our brand new cluster up and running at UB CCR!
Jinhui Li presented his first poster at Gibbs 35th annual conference in Biothermodynamics, held virtually this year. Congrats!
MonjeGroup cluster
back view
UB CCR Faculty Cluster
August 2021.
Ricardo Ramirez joins the lab from Quito, Ecuador as a PhD student in Chemical Engineering.
Welcome to Buffalo Jinhui & Ricardo!!
July 2021.
Shane delivers an excellent presentation at UB Undergraduate Research Conference, congrats!!
June 2021.
Dr. Monje-Galvan presents an invited talk at 'III International Conference Bolivia Innova.' A meeting intended to highlight and promote research and business initiatives in biotechnology, and connect latinamerican researchers.
(recording in Spanish)
May 2021.
Toyin completes her first milestone on the road towards a PhD with flying colors! Excellent work, congratulations!!
Shane Varner joins the lab as an LSAMP Undergraduate Summer Scholar; our group is growing!
Shane Varner joins the lab as an LSAMP Undergraduate Summer Scholar; our group is growing!
March 2021.
Our lab space is shaping up in preparation for the Fall semester!
February 2021.
MonjeGroup members attended the BPS national meeting (virtual)
January 2021.
Toyin Campbell, Jinhui Li, & Laura Sweezy are the first graduate students in Chemical Engineering@UB to join the MonjeGroup!