Mary L. Kraft | |
---|---|
Occupation | Professor |
Academic background | |
Alma mater | University of Illinois Chicago University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign |
Thesis | Development and characterization of fatty acid-coated microgels within microfluidic systems (2003) |
Doctoral advisor | Jeffrey S. Moore |
Academic work | |
Discipline | Biological engineering |
Institutions | University of Illinois |
Mary L. Kraft is a full professor at the department of chemical and biological engineering at the University of Illinois and is also an affiliate professor in the department of chemistry.
Kraft earned her B.S. in Biochemistry from the University of Illinois Chicago in 1998 and went on to gain her Ph.D. in Chemistry from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign in 2003 in the lab of Jeffrey S. Moore. [1] The title of her dissertation was "Development and characterization of fatty acid-coated microgels within microfluidic systems." [2] She was a Postdoctoral Fellow at Stanford University before returning to work at the University of Illinois in Urbana. [3]
Kraft's research focuses on analyzing the structure and function of cells using computational statistics and imaging techniques. [4] She won the Walter A. Shaw Young Investigator Award in Lipid Research in 2014,which is awarded by the American Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology and is given to a researcher within 10 years of completing their MD or PhD. [5] [6] She has authored more than 90 papers. [4] [7]
Lipids are a broad group of organic compounds which include fats,waxes,sterols,fat-soluble vitamins,monoglycerides,diglycerides,phospholipids,and others. The functions of lipids include storing energy,signaling,and acting as structural components of cell membranes. Lipids have applications in the cosmetic and food industries,and in nanotechnology.
Ralph T. Holman was a biochemist whose research focused on lipids and fatty acids,especially the Omega-3 fatty acid. He is regarded as the "Father of Omega-3 fatty acids",coining the term in 1963.
Benjamin Franklin Cravatt III is a professor in the Department of Chemistry at The Scripps Research Institute in La Jolla,California. Considered a co-inventor of activity-based proteomics and a substantial contributor to research on the endocannabinoid system,he is a prominent figure in the nascent field of chemical biology. Cravatt was elected to the National Academy of Sciences in 2014,and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2016. He is Gilula Chair of Chemical Biology,a Cope Scholar,and a Searle Scholar.
Peter Guy Wolynes is an American theoretical chemist and physicist. Since 2011 he has been a Bullard-Welch Foundation Professor of Science and professor of chemistry at Rice University. He is widely recognized for his significant contributions to the theories of protein folding,glasses,and gene networks. Previously he was James R. Eiszner Professor at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign,and the Francis H.C. Crick Chair of Physical Sciences at the University of California,San Diego.
Rashid Bashir is Dean of The Grainger College of Engineering,Grainger Distinguished Chair in Engineering and Professor of Bioengineering,at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. He was the Executive Associate Dean and Chief Diversity Officer at the Carle-Illinois College of Medicine at UIUC. Previously,he was the Abel Bliss Professor of Engineering.
William (Bill) S. Hammack is an American chemical engineer,and professor in the department of chemical engineering at the University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign. Hammack earned his BS in chemical engineering in 1984 from Michigan Technological University.
Michael F. Brown is an American chemist. Since 1987,he has been a Professor of Chemistry at the University of Arizona,and since 2003 has held joint appointments as a Professor of Physics and Professor of Applied Mathematics. Prior to the University of Arizona,Brown earned tenure at the University of Virginia. His research involves the application of NMR spectroscopy and other biophysical methods to study membrane lipids,liquid crystals,and membrane proteins. Brown has particularly been a pioneer in the application of solid-state NMR spectroscopy to the study of lipid bilayer dynamics.
CatherineJ. Murphy is an American chemist and materials scientist,and is the Larry Faulkner Professor of Chemistry at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (UIUC). The first woman to serve as the head of the department of chemistry at UIUC,Murphy is known for her work on nanomaterials,specifically the seed-mediated synthesis of gold nanorods of controlled aspect ratio. She is a member of the American Association for the Advancement of Science,National Academy of Sciences,and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2019.
Douglas A. Mitchell is a Professor of Chemistry at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. He holds an affiliate appointment in the Department of Microbiology and is a faculty member of the Carl R. Woese Institute for Genomic Biology. His research focuses on the chemical biology of natural products. He is known mainly for his work on the biosynthetic enzymology of ribosomally synthesized and post-translationally modified peptides (RiPPs) and genome-guided natural product discovery.
William Raymond Pearson is professor of biochemistry and molecular Genetics in the School of Medicine at the University of Virginia. Pearson is best known for the development of the FASTA format.
Lisa Michelle Jones is an associate professor of pharmaceutical sciences at the University of Maryland,Baltimore (UMB). Her research is in structural proteomics,using mass spectrometry together with fast photochemical oxidation of proteins (FPOP),allowing researchers to study the solvent accessibility of proteins experimentally.
Sarah L. Keller is an American biophysicist,studying problems at the intersection between biology and chemistry. She investigates self-assembling soft matter systems. Her current main research focus is understanding how simple lipid mixtures within bilayer membranes give rise to membrane's complex phase behavior.
Jean Elise Schaffer is an American physician-scientist. She is a Senior Investigator at the Joslin Diabetes Center,where she also serves as Associate Research Director,and she is Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School. Her work focuses on fundamental mechanisms of metabolic stress responses and the pathophysiology of diabetes complications.
Robert V. Farese,Jr., is an American physician-scientist and professor of Cell Biology at the Sloan Kettering Institute of Memorial Sloan Kettering. He is an internationally recognized leader in the study of cellular lipid metabolism and has made seminal contributions to our understanding of energy storage as triglycerides in cellular organelles called lipid droplets.
Elizabeth Villa is an American biophysicist who is Associate Professor at the University of California,San Diego. Her research considers the development of Cryo Electron Tomography and structural biology. She was named a Howard Hughes Medical Institute Research Investigator in 2021.
Jianjun Cheng is a Chinese material scientist.
Rodolfo Roberto Brenner was an Argentine emeritus professor of chemistry. He was the founder and director of the Institute of Biochemical Research of La Plata and the co-founder of the Argentine Society for Biochemical Research.
Kimani Christopher Toussaint,Jr. is an American engineer who is a professor and senior associate dean in the School of Engineering at Brown University. His research considers the development of quantitative nonlinear optical imaging methods and advanced optical techniques for nanotechnology,and the characterization of plasmonic nanostructure. He is a Fellow of Optica.
Deborah E. Leckband is an American chemist who is the Reid T. Milner Professor of Chemical Sciences and professor of chemistry at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. She works on biomaterials,tissue engineering and the nano mechanics of biomolecules. She is a Fellow of the American Institute for Medical and Biological Engineering,the American Association for the Advancement of Science,the Biomedical Engineering Society and the American Chemical Society.
Evelyn Joyce Weber was an American biochemist,and agronomist. She was a Fellow of the American Institute of Chemists and the first woman to be a faculty member of the Agronomy Department at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign.