People

Giulia Palermo

Giulia Palermo is a computational biophysicist, Assistant Professor at the University of California Riverside in the Department of Bioengineering and Chemistry

She is a native of Italy where she earned her PhD in 2013 from the Italian Institute of Technology working with Dr. Marco De Vivo. Her graduate studies led to more than 10 first-author papers, drawing on quantum chemistry and mixed quantum-classical methods to explore the mechanistic function of a number of enzymes. During her two-year post-doc at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (EPFL) in the group of Prof. Ursula Rothlisberger, she initiated studies of allostery in proteins and nucleic acids, focusing on chromatin drug development and on the mechanism of RNA splicing by the spliceosome.

In 2016, she was awarded a Swiss National Science Foundation (NSF) post-doctoral fellowship to join the group of Prof. J. Andrew McCammon at the University of California San Diego. At UCSD, she worked on novel multiscale approaches and enhanced simulations to enable studying increasingly realistic biological systems obtained through cryo-EM and tomography. Her interests focus on understanding dynamics and mechanisms of novel CRISPR-Cas gene-editing systems that are transformative for life sciences. 

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Post-docs

Dr. Pablo R. Arantes

Ph.D. Cellular and Molecular Biology, University of Porto Alegre, Brazil 2018

Dr. Souvik Sinha

Ph.D. Computational Biochemistry, University of Calcutta, India 2021

Dr. Mohd Ahsan

Ph.D. Computational Chemistry, Indian Institute of Technology 2021

Dr. Chinmai Pindi

Ph.D. Computational Chemistry, Indian Institute of Technology 2021

Graduate Students

Brandon P. Mitchell

B.S. Biochemistry, University of California, Irvine

Aakash Saha

M.S. Bioengineering, University of California, Riverside

Rohaine V. Hsu

M.S. Chemical Engineering, Cornell University

Amun C. Patel

BS. Physics, Rutgers University

Visiting students

Kazi Amirul-Hossain

Gdansk Institute of Technology, Poland

Undergraduate & High-School Students

Jacob Velasquez

Undergraduate, UC CAMP Program Fellow

Tammy Lee

Undergraduate, MARC-U STAR Program Fellow

Dania Khan

High-School Student, Riverside STEM Academy

Claire Van Der Linden

High-School Student, Riverside STEM Academy

Our Commitment to Diversity

The America of tomorrow will be highly diverse. However, the lack of know-how in computations and coding is dramatically affecting minority students, resulting in African Americans and Hispanics only making up 9% of the science and engineering workforce. Our goal is to mentor and inspire the next generation of bright minds in Computational Science, Chemistry and Biology. Toward this goal, we strive to create new programs that will encourage young students, including underrepresented minorities and women, to engage in higher education.

We strongly believe that Science and Creativity profit of diversity and we are excited about the prospect to create new knowledge in a scientific environment that welcomes diversity. Visit our outreaching website to know more about our programs.

Alumni

Former Post-docs

AlumniPosition in the labPosition after the lab
Lukasz NierzwickiPost-docGroup Leader, Gdansk University of Technology
Yogesh B. NarkhedePost-docPost-doc, University of Georgia

Former Graduate Students

AlumniPosition in the labPosition after the lab
Nehemiah ZewdeGraduate studentScientist, Genetech
Reed HarrisonGraduate studentPost-doc, University of California San Diego
Jacopo ManigrassoVisiting graduate studentPh.D. Italian Institute of Technology

Former Undergraduate and High-School Students

AlumniTime in the labPosition in the labPosition after the lab
Sayani Nani2021Undergraduate UCR
Abhinav Reddy202110th grade high-School student
Riverside STEM Academy
Sean Huang2021Undergraduate
MARC-U-STAR program
Emelda Fonki2020Undergraduate
RISE program
Medical School, UCR
Matthew Sample2020Undergraduate studentPh.D. Arizona State University
Marco Medrano2019-2020Undergraduate studentM.S. UCR
Yisi He2018-2019High-School StudentB.S. UCR
Nolan Winicki2018Undergraduate studentMedical School, UCR