POSTDOCS & STUDENTS

Postdocs

SANCHITA BADHRA | Postdoc

UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS AT AUSTIN

Sanchita Bhadra received her PhD in molecular genetics and microbiology from the University of Texas at Austin, where she now works as a Research Scientist. She pursues research in molecular engineering and point-of-care technologies to create new diagnostic/analytical methods and molecular biology reagents and processes that improve accessibility to healthcare and STEM education. Her collaborative work encompasses diverse fields including – (i) functional nucleic acids and strand displacement computational devices; (ii) nucleic acid probe and readout technologies; (iii) isothermal nucleic acid amplification assays; (iv) point-of-care diagnostics and hand-held hardware for field use; and (v) development of low cost molecular biology reagents.

Erica Barlow | Postdoc

PENNSYLVANIA STATE UNIVERSITY

Erica Barlow is a NASA Postdoctoral Program Fellow in Prof. Chris House’s group at Penn State University. She obtained both her B.Env.Sc. degree and her PhD in Geology at the University of New South Wales, Sydney, where her research focused on morphological, textural, and isotopic biosignatures in the early Earth rock record. Her current research explores the idea of past agnostic biosignatures (universal signs of life in rocks), to contribute to the development of tools to be able to recognise and describe fossilised life ‘as we don’t know it’ elsewhere.

BRADLEY BURCAR | Postdoc

GEORGETOWN UNIVERSITY / NASA HEADQUARTERS

Bradley Burcar is part of the Johnson Laboratory and NASA Headquarters as a NASA Postdoctoral Management Program Fellow. He recently finished a postdoctoral fellowship at Georgia Tech where he investigated phosphorylation and polymer formation on prebiotic Earth as a member of the Center for Chemical Evolution. He received his PhD in Chemistry from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and his BS degree in Chemical Physics from Michigan Technological University. His research has focused on early Earth chemistry under evaporative conditions, and the novel solvents and reactions that can occur within these unique environments. The fact that informational polymers eventually arose from such an environment, or similar ones, captivates him and he is always looking for chemistry that could make it happen! Bradley has previously organized AbGradCons and Proposal Writing Workshops and always looks to foster strong collaborations to help answer the complex interdisciplinary questions that Astrobiology presents.

EMMA CARRICK | Postdoc

UNIVERSITY OF GLASGOW

Emma Carrick is a postdoc in Lee Cronin’s group at the University of Glasgow. Her background is from a biological mass spectrometry, mainly proteomics, perspective. Her undergraduate degree was in Biomedical Science at Glasgow Caledonian, her MRes in Proteomic technologies at University of Glasgow, and her PhD in Mass Spectrometry method development from University of Dundee. Emma has had technical postdoc positions at the University of Manchester and at the Beatson Institute in Glasgow. Prior to joining the Cronin group, Emma was in the Biomarker Discovery group, also at the University of Glasgow. Emma enjoys looking at unusual and less common fragmentation patterns and their difficulties in data analysis. She has an appreciation of the transition of data into actual information, along with method development and pushing the machines to their limits, which she thinks is the fun bit.

LUOTH (LU) CHOU | Postdoc

NASA GODDARD SPACE FLIGHT CENTER / GEORGETOWN UNIVERSITY

Luoth (Lu) Chou is a NASA Postdoctoral Program (NPP) Fellow primarily based at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center and the Johnson Biosignatures Laboratory at Georgetown University. It was her endless fixation on the search for life in the universe that serendipitously (or perhaps inevitably) led her to conduct research on universal features of life that may be detectable with space-capable instrumentation aboard planetary exploration missions. She was formally trained in organic geochemistry through her Ph.D. at the University of Illinois at Chicago, and microbiology and astronomy through her B.S. at the University of Maryland, College Park.

GEOFFREY COOPER | Postdoc

UNIVERSITY OF GLASGOW

Geoffrey Cooper is a Senior Researcher in the Cronin Group at the University of Glasgow. He completed a MSci in Chemistry and Bioorganic Chemistry at the University of Birmingham and then moved to the University of Glasgow in 2002 to undertake a PhD in inorganic transition metal cluster chemistry. After a short research position in Universiteit Leiden, NL, he moved back to Glasgow to work on complex systems chemistry and inorganic biology. His research interests lie between non-linear systems chemistry, synthetic biology and engineering, and he is especially interested in self-organising or self-growing materials and network formation in unconstrained small molecule soups.

HAZEL FARGHER | Postdoc

UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS AT AUSTIN

Hazel Fargher is a postdoctoral researcher in Prof. Eric Anslyn’s group at the University of Texas at Austin. She received her B.S. in chemistry from Worcester Polytechnic Institute and obtained her Ph.D. in physical organic chemistry from the University of Oregon in the joint groups of Profs. Darren Johnson and Michael Haley. There, she worked on a collaborative project with Prof. Michael Pluth’s group, using organic supramolecular receptors to study the molecular recognition of hydrosulfide and other biologically relevant anions. Her current research focuses on ways to sense the chemical complexity of molecules on a surface.

NATALIE GREFENSTETTE | Postdoc

SANTA FE INSTITUTE

Natalie Grefenstette has always been interested in understanding life, and how it started or could start in different environments. This fascination with understanding life in the universe compelled her to study biochemistry at UCL so that she might better understand how life, at least as it is here on Earth, works. She later completed her Ph.D. in prebiotic chemistry so that she might better understand the chemical processes present at the start of life on Earth. She is interested in using this multidisciplinary background to help develop a deeper understanding of the organizing principles of biology and its very nature, and gain better understanding of life’s emergence on Earth and elsewhere, and how to detect life, in any chemical form it might take.

COLE MATHIS | Postdoc

UNIVERSITY OF GLASGOW

Cole Mathis is a Post-Doctoral Researcher and Team Leader of the Artificial Life team in the Cronin Group at the University of Glasgow. His research focuses on connecting theory and experiments to detect and characterize abiotic and biological chemical mixtures. His primary research interests are the origin of Life and astrobiology. Cole received a PhD in physics in 2018 from Arizona State University, where he worked with Professor Sara Imari Walker on computational models of chemical evolution.

MAEVA MILLAN | Postdoc

NASA GODDARD SPACE FLIGHT CENTER / GEORGETOWN UNIVERSITY

Maëva Millan was trained as a physicist and earned a Master’s degree in Astrophysics and Space engineering before getting back to her first love: the origins of life! That led her to her second Master’s degree in Planetary Sciences and Space Exploration. Maëva is now a chemist, splitting her time between NASA-GSFC and Georgetown University, where she works on the search for organics on Mars with the SAM instrument onboard Curiosity. She’s also interested in the influence of minerals on organics using space extraction techniques, such as pyrolysis and derivatization-gas chromatography-mass spectrometry, which she optimizes through laboratory experiments. Maëva also works on the detection and preservation of organic biosignatures in Martian and icy moon analogs in support of current and future space missions. Her favorite activities are hiking and taking pictures, especially while traveling to the beautiful landscapes where she collects samples!

DOUGLAS MOORE | Postdoc

ARIZONA STATE UNIVERSITY

Douglas Moore is a postdoctoral research associate in the BEYOND Center for Fundamental Concepts in Science at Arizona State University, where he is a member of Emergence@ASU. His research is in collaboration with Dr. Sara I. Walker (ASU) and Dr. Michael Levin (Tufts). He earned his PhD in physics from Baylor University in 2014 and worked at UT Southwestern Medical Center from 2014-2016 to develop a platform for real-time multi-leaf columnator motion tracking during radiation therapy. His current research interests focus on applying mathematical and computational techniques to problems in complex systems, physics, and biology. His research at ASU focuses on the role of information in biological systems, particularly how organisms store, read and modify their morphological patterning.

GEORGIA SOARES | Postdoc

PENNSYLVANIA STATE UNIVERSITY

Georgia Soares is a Postdoctoral Scholar in the College of Earth and Mineral Sciences, Department of Geosciences at Penn State University. Georgia is interested in the early evolution of life on Earth and the search for life in the universe. She explored this interest at the University of New South Wales where she received her PhD in Geology. Her research focuses on applying the lessons learnt from looking at ambiguous evidence of past life on earth (e.g., fossils, isotopes, trace elements) to the exploration for life on planets like Mars where the only evidence of life may be in the rock record.

Students

DANIEL DIAZ | Student

UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS

Daniel Diaz is a second-year graduate student working under Andrew Ellington and Eric Anslyn. Danny’s research focus is at the intersection of chemistry and biochemistry with data science. The goal of his PhD is to develop computational tools and machine learning models that enable data-driven chemistry and biochemistry research. Danny’s day-to-day consists of data and machine learning engineering on NMR, LCMS, NGS, and structural biology data. With structural biology data, Danny develops novel machine learning models to accelerate the engineering of functional properties into enzymes. With NGS, NMR, and LCMS data, he develops novel machine learning models to elucidate chemical complexity and how complexity is partitioned between biotic and abiotic chemicals and materials.

OLIVIA GADSON | Student

GEORGETOWN UNIVERSITY

Olivia Gadson is a junior undergraduate student in the Johnson Biosignature Lab, who studies Biology and Environmental History. She is responsible for creating an online reference sample repository for LAB. Olivia is interested in micropaleontology and how microfossils serve as proxies for paleoclimate data and contribute to the reconstruction of paleoenvironments. She is also interested in studying and developing methods which seek to understand life in extreme environments. In her free time, she enjoys baking, completing NYT mini crosswords, and going on drives with friends.

ANDREW HYDE | Student

PENNSYLVANIA STATE UNIVERSITY

Andrew Hyde is currently a PhD candidate working in the House Lab at The Pennsylvania State University in the department of Geosciences. He graduated with a BS in Biology and an MS in Marine Sciences from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Andrew is broadly interested in prebiotic chemistry, but specifically the role energetic molecules played in the origin of life on Earth. His current work concerns the formation of thioesters in various planetary environments and the functions these molecules might perform in prebiotic systems.

ANAIS ROUSSEL | Student

GEORGETOWN UNIVERSITY

Anais Roussel is a PhD student in the Johnson Biosignatures Lab. The questions that she is passionate about pertain to biosignature formation and preservation in the Solar System. Anais is particularly interested in biosignatures’ preservation processes on Mars, under the destructive effects of Galactic Cosmic Rays. This research will help determine the most plausible locations on the Martian surface where evidence of past life could still be detected by ongoing and future Mars missions. As part of the Laboratory for Agnostics Biosignatures project, Anais is exploring how mass spectral fragmentation is related to the complexity of a molecule using a MALDI ion trap mass spectrometer with a tandem mass spectrometry (MS-MS).

HILLARY SMITH | Student

PENNSYLVANIA STATE UNIVERSITY

Hillary Smith is a PhD student in geosciences and astrobiology at Penn State. She has a BA in art, focusing in analog photography and ceramics, from Earlham College and a BS in earth and space science with an emphasis in biology from the University of Washington in Seattle. Her research focuses on microbes, metallomes, and biosignatures. Her current projects include work on the elemental fractionation of metals in biotic versus abiotic processes and agnosticizing DNA sequencing techniques. Hillary’s other interests include the history of science and natural philosophy.

MAGGIE WENG | Student

GEORGETOWN UNIVERSITY

Maggie Weng is a PhD student in the Johnson Biosignatures Lab. She did her undergraduate work at Washington University in St. Louis, where she majored in earth science and was a member of the Pathfinder program with Ray Arvidson. Her research interests include understanding the habitability and ecology of extreme environments. Maggie loves traveling and fieldwork, and is always interested in looking for intersections of her astrobiology work with relevant environmental problems. In LAB, Maggie works on the surface complementarity initiative and is also interested in exploring agnostic definitions of ecology and biological community structure. Maggie is also active in an effort to develop community standards for terrestrial analogs of Ocean Worlds environments.