Author: moranlab

Yannick leaves to start an independent academic career

moranlab

Congrats and farewell to postdoctoral fellow Yannick Geiger, who has started a tenure-track position (Chaire de Professeur Junior) to co-lead the Systems Chemistry Lab at our sister institute in Strasbourg (Chimie de la Matière Complexe). Yannick was only in our group for 11 months but quickly made an impact. We wish you all the best in your independent career!

Proud note: Yannick becomes the sixth PhD/postdoc from our lab to obtain an academic position since 2019, joining Sreejith, Robert, Marie, Abhijit, and Kamila. This doesn’t count research associates (David) or visiting PhD students (Martina) who have also gone on to lead their own academic labs.

New publication

moranlab

Joris and Bora’s paper on the nonenzymatic hydration of phosphoenolpyruvate to 2-phosphoglycerate is accepted for publication in Angewandte Chemie International Edition. It is our lab’s fifth paper in that journal in 2024. The work describes an alternative strategy to search for the conditions conducive to the emergence of a protometabolism. Congrats!

Dr. Valentyn Pozhydaiev

moranlab

Congrats to Valentyn Pozhydaiev on successfully defending his thesis! He is the sixteenth PhD student to graduate from the group. Special thanks to jury members Prof. Olga Garcia Mancheño (Münster), Prof. Louis Fensterbank (Collège de France), and Dr. Anis Tlili (Lyon) for being part of the jury.

New publication

moranlab

Quentin and Robert’s mini-review of our lab’s recent work showing that essential coenzymes (ADP, NADH, PLP) exhibit nonenzymatic reactivity in the presence of metal ions is published in Science Advances. Collectively, the work gives insight into the role coenzymes might have played in a pre-enzymatic metabolism. Congrats to all!

Bora joins the lab as a MSc student

moranlab

Atalay Bora Basar becomes the first graduate student to join our lab in Ottawa. Bora recently finished his BSc at the University of Ottawa. He was a summer student in our lab in Strasbourg in 2023 and was an NSERC USRA student in our lab in Ottawa in summer 2024. He will work on nonenzymatic catalysis of metabolic reactions. Welcome, Bora!