University of California Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, CA, Ph.D. Chemical Engineering, June 2007. University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI, B.S.E. Chemical Engineering, April 2001. California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA, National Institutes of Health Postdoctoral Fellow. Department of Chemical Engineering. July 2007–09.

Junior Faculty Outstanding Undergraduate Research Mentor Award, 2015; Outstanding Advisor – BioEngineering Program, 2014; CETL/BP Junior Faculty Teaching Excellence Award, 2013; Faculty Award for Excellence in Teaching, 2011; National Institutes of Health Postdoctoral Fellowship, 2008; National Science Foundation Graduate Fellowship, 2001; University of Michigan Marion Sarah Parker Scholar, 1999; University of Michigan Regents Scholarship, 1997

Protein vesicles incorporating functional, globular proteins have potential in a number of bio-applications such as drug delivery, biocatalysis, and sensing. We have previously created protein vesicles from mCherry-zipper-ELP protein complexes where ELP is a thermo-responsive elastin-like polypeptide, zipper is a coiled-coil, and mCherry is a model folded protein.

As we utilize these vesicles, we have replaced mCherry with more useful functional proteins and have engineered the vesicles to provide both stability and stimuli responsiveness. We implemented non-natural amino acid incorporation to enable photocrosslinking strategies to stabilize vesicles and control their swelling and release of cargo as a function of salt concentration. We have modified the ELP amino acid sequence to create vesicles that are pH sensitive and swell or disassemble at acidic pH or form vesicles with different sizes and stabilities.

With this information, we have demonstrated assembly of biocatalytic vesicles with significant improvements in activity over soluble enzyme and produced vesicles for drug delivery capable of carrying and releasing therapeutic cargoes. The wide range of vesicle properties and functions exhibited in these examples, highlight the versatility of protein vesicles as functional and responsive protein materials.