Department Updates

2019 Distinguished Achievement Award Winner

April 30th, 2019

The Distinguished Achievement Awards, sponsored by The Association of Former Students and Texas A&M University, recognized 24 outstanding faculty and staff for superior performance in the classroom, laboratory, campus office, or clinic, in these categories: Teaching; Research; Student Relations; Administration; Extension, Outreach, and Continuing Education; Staff; and Graduate Mentoring. The university-level Distinguished Achievement Awards were…

Texas Genetics Society Presentation Award

April 30th, 2019

Earlier this month at the Texas Genetics Society 46th Annual Meeting, Donna Iadarola from Dr. Vishal Gohil’s lab, received the Best Graduate Student Platform Presentation Award for her talk titled: Molecular mechanisms underlying mitochondrial phosphatidylethanolamine import. Congratulations Donna!

Goldwater Fellowship Recipient

April 30th, 2019

Alison Vicary, a BioBio senior undergraduate in Dr. Vishal Gohil’s lab, received this year’s Barry Goldwater Scholarship! This is the most prestigious, nationally competitive undergraduate scholarship in the natural sciences, mathematics, and engineering in America. This award comes with $7,500 and was given to 496 college students from across the United States, with Alison being…

President’s Meritorious Service Award Winner

April 24th, 2019

Monday, April 22, was Texas A&M University’s 32nd annual presentation of the President’s Meritorious Service Awards. President Michael K. Young recognized 25 individual staff member, two supervisors and two staff teams with this prestigious award. They were recognized for demonstrating their commitment to the Aggie core values of excellence, integrity, leadership, loyalty, respect and selfless…

President’s Excellence Fund Symposium

April 16th, 2019

The President’s Excellence Fund Symposium, took place on Thursday, April 4, which was held in the Annenberg Presidential Conference Center. The symposium consisted of presentations given by X-Grant award recipients and poster sessions by T3 award recipients. Four of our faculty were T3 award recipients: Drs. Tatyana Igumenova, Frank Raushel, Jim Sacchettini, and Junjie Zhang….

1st Annual Biophysical Society Symposium

April 16th, 2019

The Biophysical Society had their first annual symposium of the year on March 29. Students of different departments ranging from Biochemistry, Chemistry and Engineering, participated in either oral presentations, or poster presentations. Of the six oral presentations, two were from Biochemistry, two from Chemistry and two from Biomedical Engineering, along with one of them being…

NACADA Regional 7 Conference Winners

March 13th, 2019

NACADA is the National Academic Advising Association and region 7 represents the states of Arkansas, Kansas, Louisiana, Oklahoma, Missouri, and Texas. On Saturday, March 9, the NACADA Regional 7 Conference was held in San Antonio, TX, where both Dr. Mary Bryk and Dr. Carol Vargas were recognized for their hard work as advisors! Dr. Mary…

Finding cancer-promoting proteins in bacteria

January 28th, 2019

Researchers in the Hu lab created the online data browser for the E. coli-to-Cancer Gene-function Atlas (ECGA), which was described in the Jan 10, 2019 issue of Cell. “Our cells make protein carcinogens,” said co-corresponding author Dr. Susan M. Rosenberg, Ben F. Love Chair in Cancer Research and professor of molecular and human genetics, of molecular…

The First Awarding of Thomas L. Patterson Fellowship

January 23rd, 2019

The first awarding of the Thomas L. Patterson Graduate Fellowship in the President’s Office at Texas A&M University. Left to right: Dr. Jason Gill, Dr. Thomas Patterson, President Michael Young, Adriana Hernandez Morales, Dr. Steffanie Strathdee, Dr. Ry Young, Vice Chancellor and Dean Dr. Patrick Stover. (Photo credit: Division of Marketing & Communications, Texas A&M…

Vice Chancellor’s Award in Excellence Winners

January 18th, 2019

On January 7, The Vice Chancellor’s Award in Excellence was held in the Texas A&M Hotel and Conference Center. This awards program recognizes the commitment and outstanding contributions of faculty and staff across Texas A&M AgriLife. These awards provide us with a unique opportunity to celebrate the contributions and achievements of our faculty, students, and…

Dr. Chapkin Named AAAS Fellow

December 3rd, 2018

Dr. Robert Chapkin has been named American Association for the Advancement of Science Fellow. He is the William W. Allen Endowed Chair in Nutrition and Chronic Disease Prevention at Texas A&M. He is a University Distinguished Professor, Regents Professor and University Faculty Fellow in the Program in Integrative Nutrition and Complex Diseases. He is also…

University Outstanding Juniors Award Winner

November 9th, 2018

Karissa Yamaguchi is a Senior working under Dr. Xiuren Zhang and just received the University Outstanding Juniors Award! Both Karissa and Dr. Zhang attended a breakfast for the Phi Kappa Phi Honors Society at the University Club, where Karissa and other students were honored for their achievements. Congratulations Karissa! We’re all so proud of you!

Flower Fund Success

November 5th, 2018

Every year in October, we host our Departmental Flower Fundraiser. This enables us to host events in order to raise money to buy flowers for those who incur a hospital stay, give birth, adopt, or lose a family member. This year, we hosted a Hula Hoop Competition, Costume Contest and Door Decorating Contest. Throughout the…

Work of Graduate Student, Sachin Katti, Featured on Cover of Metallomics

October 15th, 2018

The work of Sachin Katti, a graduate student in the Department of Biochemistry and Biophysics (Igumenova lab), was recently featured on the cover of Metallomics (Metallomics. 2018 Sep 19;10(9):1211-1222. doi: 10.1039/c8mt00135a). In this manuscript, the authors report structural, thermodynamic, and kinetic characterization of Pb(II) interactions with the calcium-sensing domain of Synaptotagmin 1. Synaptotagmin 1 is…

2018 NACADA Outstanding Advising Global Award Winner

October 10th, 2018

The National Conference on Academic Advising (NACADA) is an association of professional advisors, counselors, faculty, administrators, and students working to enhance the educational development of students. The Outstanding Advising Awards annually recognize individuals who have demonstrated qualities associated with outstanding academic advising of students or outstanding academic advising administration. The conference was held in Phoenix,…

College of Agriculture and Life Sciences Awards Ceremony

September 14th, 2018

On September 13, the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences held their College Awards Ceremony. The ceremony consisted of the recognition of new, promoted, and tenured faculty, presentation of awards, 2018 special recognition, and recipients of National and University-level awards. In the Department of Biochemistry and Biophysics, we had one new faculty member and six…

NMR Facility Officially Relocated

September 12th, 2018

The relocation of the 600 superconducting magnet from the old to the new Biomolecular Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (NMR) facility has been completed. The magnet successfully reached the field of 14.1 Tesla and is currently in the stabilization phase. The Biomolecular NMR facility has been in the works for several years – and it is finally…

Best Poster Award in ICORS 2018

September 3rd, 2018

Congratulations to Charlie Farber, 2nd year PhD student in Dr. Dmitry Kurouski’s Lab, for winning the best poster award at ICORS 2018 Conference in Korea. ICORS is the International Conference on Raman Spectroscopy that is held every other year in Asia, Europe and America. This year, around 900 scientists came from all different parts of…

NIH Fellowship Winner

August 9th, 2018

Congratulations to Natalie Garza, who has recently been awarded the Ruth L. Kirschstein Predoctoral Fellowship from the NIH. These prestigious and highly competitive fellowships are given to very few students every year. The purpose of this fellowship is to support the health-related research of predoctoral students from population groups that have been shown to be…

Gohil Lab discovers a potential therapy for disorders of copper metabolism

August 6th, 2018

Exciting new research from the Gohil Lab shows that elesclomol, an investigational anti-cancer drug, can be repurposed for the treatment of copper metabolism disorders. This finding published in a recent issue of PNAS is of high biomedical significance as inherited mutations that prevent copper delivery to a critical mitochondrial enzyme result in fatal infantile disorders…

ASBMB National Award Winners

July 2nd, 2018

The department received some outstanding news this week! Dr. Dorothy Shippen, along with Dr. Vytas Bankaitis, will be receiving an ASBMB award in April 2019 in Orlando, FL. Dr. Shippen will receive the William C. Rose Award and Dr. Bankaitis will receive the Avanti Award in Lipids. For further details, please see the link below…

Bio/Bio Welcomes a new crew of REU students!

June 19th, 2018

Dr. Gary Kunkel and Dr. Mary Bryk are once again coordinating a summer research experience for undergraduates who come from all over the United States. We have been very fortunate to have a few of these students make a decision to further their education and apply to our graduate program. We truly hope they all…

Dean Patrick Stover talks about Folate Metabolism

May 24th, 2018

Ashley Holt Joins an Elite Group of Astronaut Scholars

May 21st, 2018

Ashley Holt is a Biomed Engineering Student who works in the Center for Phage Technology in the Department of Biochemistry and Biophysics at Texas A&M University. She has been selected by the Astronaut Scholarship Foundation to join an elite group of Astronaut Scholars for the 2018/2019 academic school year. As a part of this honor,…

Exciting News from Kurouski Lab

May 21st, 2018

We love to share the excitement of our faculty. Pictured in this photo is Charles Farber and Dr. Dmitry Kurouski and the excitement can only be heard directly by the words of Dr. Dmitry Kurouski who reports as follows: “I’m glad to share this exciting news with you: my group just showed that using a…

Xiuren Zhang’s Publishes in Nature

May 16th, 2018

Read the article in Nature: SWI2/SNF2 ATPase CHR2 remodels pri-miRNAs via Serrate to impede miRNA production Read the article on AgriLife Today: AgriLife scientists uncover a new face of a famous protein, SWI2/SNF2 ATPase

Dr. Mary Bryk Recognized during the Annual UAC Banquet

May 10th, 2018

Dr. Mary Bryk won the 2018 Margaret Annette Peters Advising Award during the annual University Advisors Banquet that was held on Monday, May 7, 2018. This award recognizes faculty and administrators who embody the spirit of caring, compassionate and genuine concern for the welfare of individual students. She is pictured with Mr. Vince Hernandez who…

Rafael in the Spotlight, again!

May 10th, 2018

We are so super proud of Rafael Almanzar for being one of the twenty-five staff that were recognized during the President’s Meritorious Service Award ceremony that was held on April 23, 2018. This is a very prestigious award given by our university, sponsored by the Office of the President, and funded by the Association of…

Keya Mukherjee-Outstanding Student Indeed!

May 10th, 2018

Keya Mukherjee, one of our Biochemistry majors working in Dr. Frank Raushel’s lab, was recognized as an outstanding student at the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences Convocation through her participation in the Agricultural and Natural Resources Policy (ANRP) program. It’s through ANRP that she will be working with the Food and Agriculture Organization of…

What, Another Title for Dr. Young?

April 24th, 2018

That is right, he is still here, “young” enough to retire and do other things, but still loving his work here and enjoying his career at Texas A&M University. Dr. Ryland F. Young, III was just recognized as a Distinguished Professor at Texas A&M University. In 2016, he was named Regents Professor and in 2006…

2018 U.S. Senator Phil Gramm Doctoral Fellowship Awards

April 24th, 2018

We celebrate with Karl Gorzelnik who received a U.S. Senator Phil Gramm Doctoral Fellowship in April 2018. The Senator Phil Gramm fellowship was established to promote, encourage and reward outstanding teaching and research by doctoral students whose command of their respective disciplines exemplifies the meaning of scholar/mentor in the highest sense. Karl is currently a…

AgriLife Research team helping better understand causes of muscular dystrophy

April 7th, 2018

Writer: Blair Fannin, 979-845-2259, [email protected] Contact: Dr. Vlad Panin, 979-845-9274, [email protected] COLLEGE STATION – Using fruit flies, Texas A&M AgriLife Research scientists may be one step closer to better understanding the pathological mechanisms of muscular dystrophy. The researchers say they hope their work could assist medical doctors in prescribing effective therapies in the future. According…

Rafael Almanzar….Who can keep up with this guy?

March 29th, 2018

On Feb. 22, 2018 Rafael was the recipient of the 2018 NACADA Region 7 Certificate of Merit for Excellence in Advising, Primary Role. On Feb. 28, 2018 Rafael received a TEXAAN Scholarship for 2018. On March 1, 2018 he learned, along with Rebecca Hapes and Gail Rowe, that their publication was accepted and published in…

Congressman Bill Flores Receives Education from Our Students

March 29th, 2018

Keya Mukherjee (Raushel Lab) is an officer with an organization called Aggies in Science, Technology and Engineering Policy (ASTEP). Through ASTEP they had invited Congressman Bill Flores to tour a few labs in the ILSB in order for him to get a sense of how federal tax dollars are being spent in science labs. Students…

Stellar Performance Adriana, Drake and Charles!

March 29th, 2018

We had three of our graduate students from the Department of Biochemistry and Biophysics placing first place during TAMU Student Research Week.  Adriana Carolina Hernandez Moralez from Dr. Ry Young’s lab, received 1st place with her research talk.  Also, Charles Farber from Dr. Dmitri Kurouski’s lab received 1st place with his Research Talk.  In addition,…

Starting the Year off Right….

January 9th, 2018

It was a packed house to congratulate our 2018 Vice Chancellor’s Awards recipients at this years Texas A&M AgriLife Awards Ceremony. Dr. Chavela Carr was first up, as she was awarded this year’s Vice Chancellor Award in Teaching, then came, Mr. Jimmy Trinh, from Dr. Lanying Zeng’s lab, who was awarded the Graduate Student Research…

A Moment with the Staff

December 19th, 2017

At the December 18, 2017 Holiday Celebration the staff presented Dr. Gregory D. Reinhart with a plaque to recognize his 17 years of service as their boss, leader, friend, colleague and department head. Words cannot express how much Dr.Reinhart, and his wife, Ruth Reinhart, have meant to so many of us. From watching our babies…

Dr. Gohil Named 2017-2018 Montague-Center for Teaching Excellence Scholar

December 8th, 2017

The Office of the Dean of Faculties and the Center for Teaching Excellence (CTE) proudly announce this year’s Montague-CTE Scholar to Vishal Gohil, PhD. “I feel honored to receive the Montague-CTE Scholar Award. This award is very gratifying especially because I feel passionate about my teaching and it is good to know that my efforts…

Cocktails for Superbugs

November 27th, 2017

What exactly kind of cocktails does Dr. Ry Young make? Read and listen to learn more about this professors miraculous cure for Dr. Tom Patterson.

They Funded Me…….

November 2nd, 2017

That is correct, “they”, (meaning plural). Alfredo Erazo-Oliveras, a recent graduate student of our department, just received funding from the National Institute of Health AND a Ford Fellowship. What an honor! Read the full story on Texas A&M Today.

Oh My….. $1,000.46 + Pies + Costumes + Donations + Pumpkins = HEROES!

November 1st, 2017

October resulted in another busy but fun Fall Extravaganza for the departmental flower fund! Many thanks goes out to everyone who helped make it happen once again this year. We couldn’t do this without all of the support from everyone within the department and even outside of the department. We had VWR, Documation, Caremed, Napa…