News
2023
November
We excitedly welcome Mobina Alimadad and Hadley Mosby to the lab as our newest Ph.D. students!
Rachel, Vince, Mark, Zixian, Janine, and Clare attend the AICHE meeting in Orlando. Mark and Zixian present in the Meet the Postdoc Candidates session, Zixian gives a talk in the Biomaterials for Drug Delivery Session, Mark gives a poster in the Biomaterials session, Janine and Clare give posters in the Undergraduate Poster Competition, and Rachel gives a talk in the 8A Plenary Session, Emerging Areas in Polymer Science and Engineering! We also very much enjoyed encouraging undergraduates to join us at UVA for the Ph.D. at our recruiting booth and Taco Night!
Congratulations to Janine on her 2nd place poster award in the Food, Pharma, and Biotech III division of the undergraduate poster session at AICHE!
Congratulations to Clare on her 3rd place poster award in the Computing and Process Control III division of the undergraduate poster session session at AICHE!
October
Congratulations to Mara and Keelin on their paper, Elucidating the Effect of Amine Charge State on Poly(β-amino ester) Degradation Using Permanently Charged Analogs, published in ACS Macro Lett. this week! They show that installing permanent quaternary ammonium counter ions onto poly(amino ester)s not only imparts cationic character at high pH, but also slows degradation.
Rachel visits Clemson University for a seminar and enjoys visiting Jess Larsen's lab and meeting with awesome bioengineering and chemical engineering students and faculty!
September
Tremendous congratulations to Jerwin, Aditi, and Darren, who all passed their qualifying exams with flying colors! We are so happy for your and even more happy to have you in the group!
Rachel visits Lehigh University for a seminar and enjoys visiting Whitney Blocher McTigue's awesome new lab!
August
Congratulations to Israt and Vince on their paper on peptide stereocomplexes with the Lampe lab published in JACS! In this paper, entitled 'Peptide stereocomplexation orchestrates assembly of hydrogel biomaterials', we highlight how peptide stereocomplexation transforms biomaterial morphology, mechanics, and proteolytic stability. This work raises exciting new questions on the role of peptide sequence in determining the materials properties resulting from stereocomplexation that we're excited to explore!
Mark attends the NextProf Nexus workshop at the University of Michigan!
Rachel shares our lab's work at the International Symposium on Polyelectrolytes, in Prague and visits the Hofmeister Series plaque!
July
Mark presents a poster at the Controlled Release Society Meeting in Vegas!
Mark, Zixian, Vince, and Rachel attend our department's inaugural Research Retreat at Wintergreen Resort in VA! Mark, Zixian, and Vince present posters, and Rachel gives a talk about our lab's future directions! There was also a pretty strenuous hike...
Our lab attends the 6th Annual Mid-Atlantic Biomanufacturing Symposium in Charlottesville!
June
Mara, Zixian, and Rachel attend the Polymers GRC in South Hadley, MA! Mara and Zixian present posters at the preceding GRS and the GRC, and Rachel gives a talk in the Late Breaking Topics early career session!
Janine Ramtahal, a rising senior undergraduate chemical engineering student at Prairie View A&M University in Marco Giles' lab, joins us for the summer to develop polymer hydrogels cross-linked with peptide stereocomplexes! Welcome, Janine!
Rachel attends the Future Faculty Workshop at Texas A&M University as a mentor, and enjoys meeting all the awesome future leaders in soft materials research!
May
Mara successfully defends her thesis and becomes our lab's 1st Ph.D! We are all so grateful to her for her stellar leadership, creativity, and commitment to high-quality work and mentorship that templated so much of our new lab! Her thesis, entitled, 'Expanding the scope of poly(β-amino ester)s by investigating degradation behavior and enhancing functionality' helped us to understand poly(amino ester) degradation and expanded the design space of this highly tunable, synthetically accessible class of degradable polymers. During her time in our lab, she published 3 papers with 3 undergraduate mentees (James, Lexi, and Keelin), received multiple awards for excellence in safety, teaching, and research, and left a lasting impact on the group! She starts a postdoc in Marc Hillmyer's group at the University of Minnesota in July. Congratulations, Mara, and thank you!
JP graduates with his B.S. in Chemical Engineering! We are all so excited for him as he starts his Ph.D. in chemical engineering at the University of Colorado Boulder this fall. Congratulations, JP, and thanks for all of your awesome work and for being an outstanding member of the lab!
Jerwin receives the Gaden award for excellence in coursework! Congratulations, Jerwin!
April
Rachel visits the University of New Hampshire for a seminar and enjoys visiting Erik Berda and Nate Oldenhuis' labs!
Rachel visits Case Western Reserve University for a seminar and enjoys visiting Sveta Morozova's awesome new lab!
Rachel receives a 2022-2023 Hartfield Excellence in Teaching Award from the Jefferson Scholar's Foundation
March
Rachel shares our lab's work in the ACS Poly 'Polymers at the Interface with Biology' session at the ACS meeting in Indianapolis.
February
Rachel enjoys visiting Notre Dame, her alma mater, for a seminar and visiting Matt Webber, Jen Schaefer, Yamil Colon, and many other friends, as well as her undergraduate research advisor, Paul Bohn! Many thanks, Matt for the invite!
- January
Elli Brna, a 2nd year chemical engineering undergraduate student, joins the lab to work with Zixian on antimicrobial peptide-polymer conjugates. Welcome, Elli!
Josh Alexander, a 3rd year biomedical engineering undergraduate student, joins the lab to work with Israt and Darren on peptide stereocomplexes. Welcome, Josh!
Israt, Vince, and Rachel attend the inaugural Peptide Materials GRC in Galveston, TX, where they presented posters and enjoyed connecting with the fantastic community of researchers advancing peptide materials!
Rachel gives a seminar at Prairie View A&M University, and enjoys visiting with chemical engineering and chemistry students there and visiting Marco Giles' lab!
Congratulations to Vince, Zixian, and Qinmo on publishing their paper with the Hughes lab on antimicrobial peptides from the immune system protein, CXCL10 in ACS Infectious Diseases!
Congratulations to Mara, Lexi, and Vince on their paper, 'Net anionic poly(β-amino ester)s: synthesis, pH-dependent behavior, and complexation with cationic cargo' in Polymer Chemistry! Using thiol-alkyne click chemistry, they install 2 anionic thiols onto each repeating unit of traditionally cationic PBAEs to invert the charge, which imparted interesting pH-dependent solution behavior and allowed complexation of cationic cargo.
2022
November
We are so excited to welcome Aditi Gourishankar, Jerwin Go, and Darren Miller to the lab as our newest Ph.D. students!
Rachel gives a seminar at Wesleyan University, where she enjoyed visiting Ben Elling's awesome new lab!
October
Rachel shares our lab's work at the International Symposium on Stimuli-Responsive Materials in Windsor, CA and the ACS Poly Polymers and Nanotechnology Workshop in Napa, CA!
September
Congratulations to Mark on his 1st place summer seminar!
Israt shares her work on new disinfecting materials for water purification at the Pure Madi event!
Keelin Reily, a 2nd year Biomedical Engineering undergraduate, and Mackenzie Klepsig, a second year chemical engineering undergraduate, join the lab!
Rachel gives a seminar at Auburn University, where she enjoyed visiting Symone Alexander's awesome new lab!
August
Mark and Zixian become our lab's newest PhD candidates!! Congratulations on your stellar work and presentations, and thanks for your absolutely phenomenal contributions to our lab's research and culture!
Mara and Rachel present their work, and Mara presides for a session at the ACS meeting in Chicago
Rachel gives a Center for Vascular and Heart Research Center seminar at Virginia Tech Carilion
July
Mark, Zixian, and Rachel attend and present posters the Drug Carriers in Biology and Medicine Gordon Research Conference! Mark and Zixian attended the preceding GRS as well, and we had a great time making friends and learning from this awesome community!
Our lab receives an NIH Maximizing Investigator Research Award (MIRA)! We are so excited and grateful for the support to continue our efforts to use polymers to maximize the function of therapeutic peptides. Read more about this work and award here.
June
Mara and Rachel attend the Tosoh Polymer Conference in Hollywood, CA -congratulations to Mara on her 1st place poster award!
May
Congrats to our labs newest B.S. in Chemical Engineering graduates, Taylor, Chris, and Justin! Taylor is at the University of Delaware pursuing her M.S. in Biopharmaceutical Sciences, Justin is starting his Ph.D. in chemical engineering at the University of Delaware, and Chris is an intern at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL)!
April
Clare and Liza, joint undergraduate students in the Letteri and Lampe labs, present a poster at the Society for Biomaterials Meeting in Baltimore, MD!
Clare and Liza present their work at the SEAS Engineering Open House, and Taylor and Rachel tell perspective UVa undergraduates about all the possibilities Chemical Engineering has to offer!
Vince starts his internship at Tempo Therapeutics in San Diego funded by the NIH Biotechnology Training Program at UVa.
Our lab receives an NSF CAREER award for developing new ways to control mechanics and lifetime in dynamic hydrogel biomaterials! We're so excited to start this project and to work with Marco Giles and his students at Prairie View A&M University to structure the start of undergraduate research experiences while studying how polymer architecture impacts these dynamic hydrogel properties! Read more here.
Clare, Liza, Justin, and Drew (joint undergraduate students in the Letteri and Lampe labs) present a poster at UVA's Undergraduate Research Symposium!
Israt presents her work on stereochemistry-driven gelation at the University of Virginia Engineering Research symposium (UVERS).
Congratulations to Mara on winning an PMSE Best Poster Award at the ACS Meeting in San Diego for her work on poly(amino ester)s! Read more here.
March
Congratulations to Mara on her travel scholarship to attend the APS DPOLY short course on sustainable polymers! Read more here.
Our group attends the Chemical Engineering Research Symposium (CHEERS): Israt gives a talk, and Vince, Zixian, and Mark present posters!
Congratulations to Clare on winning a Harrison Undergraduate Research Award to study the role of stereochemistry on the assembly of peptides!
Our group enjoys welcoming and recruiting prospective new graduate students!
February
We partner with Jim Smith's lab at UVa and their company, Silivhere Technologies, to develop water purification tablets. Read more here.
2021
December
Congratulations to Vince, Israt, and Emma on publishing their review article on peptide assembly in Acta Biomaterialia! In collaboration with the Lampe Lab, we enjoyed reviewing the design, preparation, characterization, and application of assembling peptides. We hope that this will be useful for new and experienced researchers in this field with backgrounds ranging from chemistry to tissue engineering.
Rachel gives a talk at Pacifichem in the session, 'Precision Polymer Synthesis and Supramolecular Architectures for Designable Functionality' (held virtually)
November
Jack Dunleavy, a 2nd year undergraduate ChE student, joins the lab. Welcome, Jack!
Liza and Clare, joint students in our lab and the Lampe Lab, won first place in the MESD undergraduate poster competition at the AIChE meeting - congratulations!
Taylor, Liza, Clare, and Rachel present research at the AIChE meeting in Boston
October
Our lab attends the Fifth Annual Mid-Atlantic Biomanufacturing Symposium in Charlottesville. Zixian wins first place and Mark wins third place in the poster competition - congratulations! Israt, Vince, Mark, Zixian, Clare, and Liza present research and Rachel co-leads a session on Clinical Translation of Biomaterials.
Our lab takes hands-on fire extinguisher training with fire inspector, Doug McGlothlin from UVA EHS. Thanks Doug!
Hamsini Muralikrishnan, a 3rd year undergraduate ChE student, and Mara Pettit, a 2nd year ChE student, join the lab. Welcome Hamsini and Mara!
August
Israt gives a talk at the Fall ACS meeting in Atlanta
Mara, Vince, and Israt become the Letteri lab's first Ph.D. candidates! Congratulations and thank you for your stellar leadership!
July
Chris Hawkins, a 4th year undergraduate ChE student, joins the lab to work on antimicrobial peptide-polymer conjugates with Zixian Cui. Welcome, Chris!
Lexi, Justin, Liza, and Clare present their work at the Center for Advanced Biomanufacturing Summer Research Symposium
Congratulations to Mara and James on publishing their paper in the Journal of Polymer Science! In this work, we highlight the role of buffering in on the solution properties and degradation behavior of poly(amino ester)s to guide their storage and use.
June
Lexi Cuomo, a 3rd year ChE undergraduate, and Justin Harrington, a 4th year ChE undergraduate, join the lab! Also, Clare Cocker, a 2nd year ChE undergraduate, and Liza Harold, a 3rd year biomedical engineering undergraduate, join the Lampe and Letteri labs as our first co-advised students! Welcome, Lexi, Justin, Liza, and Clare!
May
James Mullin and Emma Laudermilch graduate with their B.S. in chemical engineering - congratulations, and we're so grateful for your contributions as two of the first members of our new group! Emma is working as an engineer at Illumina in San Diego, CA and James is a Ph.D. student in Chemical Engineering at the University of Delaware.
Mara receives the Department of Chemical Engineering TA award - congratulations, Mara!
Our first review article was published as part of the 2021 RSC Biomaterials Science Emerging Investigator Issue! Together with our collaborators Drs. Molly Hughes and Matt Crawford in the Division of Infectious Disease and International Heath within the UVa School of Medicine, we combine polymer/peptide chemistry and infectious disease perspectives to review the design, synthesis, and characterization of antimicrobial peptide-polymer conjugates and highlight the role of molecular architecture on the properties and antimicrobial properties of these conjugates. Congrats to Zixian for leading this effort and to co-authors Qinmo, Mark, Vince, Taylor, and Madeline!
Vince's paper with Greg Grewal in the Highley lab was accepted in Biomaterials Science! We show that coiled coil peptides can enable spatiotemporal control of biomolecule binding and on-demand release.
January
Jonathan Paul ('JP'), a 3rd year chemical engineering undergraduate, joins the lab. Welcome, JP!
2020
December
Rachel gives a talk at the 3rd National Chiao Tung University (Hsinchu, Taiwan) Conference on Organic Synthesis (held virtually)
November
Kelly Bukovic (University of Florida) joins the Letteri and Caliari labs as our first jointly advised student!
June
Taylor Bloom, a 3rd year ChE student, joins the lab!
May
Vince receives an NIH Biotechnology Training Fellowship – congratulations, Vince!
Madeline and Becca graduate with their B.S. in chemical engineering – congratulations!
April
Qinmo Luo (Ph.D. Chemistry, Case Western University) joins our lab from Emily Pentzer’s group!
March
Mara receives the 2020 Chemical Engineering Dupont Student Safety Award – congratulations, Mara!
February
Zixian receives a 2019-2020 Gaden Award for exemplary performance in coursework - congratulations, Zixian!
January
Gordon Lee, a second year undergraduate ChE student, joins the lab. Welcome, Gordon!
2019
December
Rachel gives a talk at the Next Generation Soft Materials Workshop in Savannah, GA
November
Graduate students Mark Bannon (M.S., CHE, New Jersey Institute of Technology) and Zixian Cui (M.S. CHE, Carnegie Mellon University) join the lab. Welcome, Mark and Zixian!
September
We are certified as a Gold level Green lab by the UVA Sustainability Office– congrats Sustainability Committee and all!
Rachel gives a seminar in the Department of Chemistry at UVA
July
Mara, Vince, and Rachel attend GPC2019; Rachel gives an early career presentation
The Letteri Lab hosts students from the Village School Science Camp
June
Rachel gives a talk at the Molecular Engineering of Soft Matter workshop at the Telluride Science Research Center in Telluride, CO
Rachel attends the Polymers Gordon Research Conference in South Hadley, MA
May
Rachel, Vince and Elyse attend the UVA Brain Symposium
Elyse He’bert (Prairie View A&M University ’20, Chemical Engineering) joins the lab!
We are certified as a Silver level Green lab by the UVA Sustainability Office– congrats Sustainability Committee and all!
The Letteri lab receives hands-on fire extinguisher training with fire inspector, Doug McGlothlin from UVA EHS. Thanks Doug!
April
Jessie receives 1st place for her oral presentation in the UVA undergraduate research symposium - congratulations, Jessie!
The Letteri Lab co-hosts an event, ‘Polymers: The technology behind marbles, bouncy balls, and gels’ at the Engineering Open House
We are certified as a green lab by the UVA Sustainability Office – congrats Sustainability Committee and all!
March
Mara, Vince, and Rachel judge the Piedmont Regional Science Fair with other chemical engineering friends from the Caliari, Berger, Giri, and Choi labs!
February
Our Waters HPLCs and Tosoh GPC are installed!
Justin, Mara, James, and Becca start the Letteri lab sustainability committee!
January
January – Israt, Mara, Emma, and Rachel start the Letteri lab safety committee!
Rachel receives the Thomas E. Hutchinson Award from the Trigon Engineering Society for obvious love of teaching and outreach to students.
2018
November
Our CEM Liberty Blue peptide synthesizer is installed!
The Letteri lab attends the 3rd Annual Biomanufacturing Symposium at UVA
Madeline Clore (3rd year ChE undergraduate), Justin Fernandes (2nd year ChE undergraduate), and Becca Richardson (3rd year ChE undergraduate) join the lab!
October
Graduate students Israt Jahan Duti (Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology), Vince Gray (Youngstown State University), and Mara Kuenen (Bucknell University) join the lab!
September
Emma Laudermilch and James Mullin (2nd year ChE undergraduates) join the lab!
August
Jessie Eoff (1st year computer science undergraduate) and Julianna Suarez (2nd year ChE undergraduate) join the lab!