The Niepielko Lab
Where evolution and developmental biology meet
Dr. Matthew G. Niepielko is an Assistant Professor of Computational Biology and coordinator for the Group Summer Scholars Research Program for high school students at Kean. His laboratory investigates the molecular mechanisms that regulate animal development and fertility using different species of Drosophila (fruit flies) as a model system. Dr. Niepielko has identified several developmental mechanisms that mediate the evolution of morphologies during Drosophila eggshell formation. He has also discovered key mechanisms that regulate cell polarity during Drosophila development by employing a novel technique that couples biological experiments with computational analyses. The Niepielko Lab currently explores how germ cell mRNA composition alters animal fertility and how changes in gene expression drives evolution.
Dr. Niepielko received his Ph.D. in Computational and Integrative Biology from Rutgers University in 2014. In 2016, he received the Ruth L. Kirschstein National Research Service from the National Institutes of Health to complete his postdoctoral training at Princeton University. In 2021, he was awarded an Academic Research Enhancement Award (AREA) from the National Institutes of Health to support research activities at Kean University. In 2023, Dr. Niepielko was awarded the Faculty Early Career Development Program Award (CAREER Award) that will fund his research and STEM education program, New Jersey's Research Alliance for Inclusive STEM Education (NJ-RAISE), for five years.
Read the official state recognition of NJ-RAISE! NJ-RAISE State Senate Resolution
Read the special letter recognizing NJ-RAISE from NJ's Governor, Phil Murphy! NJ-RAISE Governor Murphy
Funding
News
2/13/24
Congrats to everyone for sharing our research, see the video!
11/9/23 AWARD 🏆!
Congrats to Ahad Shabazz-Henry for receiving the prestigious Victoria Finnerty Award from the Genetics Society of America! Keep up the amazing work!
10/11/23 AWARD 🏆!
I am very excited to share that I received The Presidential Award for Excellence in Research. Thank you to all of the current and former members of the Niepielko Lab that has made this possible!!
8/31/23 SHOUT OUT ALERT! 🍾
The Niepielko Lab was acknowledged by Kean's President, Dr. Repollet, during the fall 2023 Opening Day Ceremony! Take a look!
8/3/23 NEW PAPER ALERT! 🍾
The Niepielko Lab is happy to share our latest work that was published in Molecular Biology and Evolution, Germ Granule Evolution Provides Mechanistic Insight into Drosophila Germline Development
A HUGE congrats to undergraduate first author, Dominique Doyle, who started on this project in spring of 2020 as a freshman!
8/3/23 Congrats to the high school students for presenting their summer discoveries! Good luck in the future!
8/1/23 Congratulations to Ahad Shabazz-Henry and Gisselle Hidalgo for completing their Visiting Summer Researcher projects at Princeton University! Special thanks to the Gavis Lab for hosting them this summer!
7/6/23 Good luck Bianca Ortega on your High Performance Computing Internship at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center this summer!! The entire Niepielko Lab is very proud of you!
https://www.nccs.nasa.gov/news-events/nccs-highlights/Interns-2023
7/6/23 Welcome high school summer researchers to the Niepielko Lab's Group Summer Scholars Program at Kean University!!
5/26/23 NEW PAPER ALERT! 🍾
Special thanks to the Gao Lab from Indiana University Northwest for inviting us to collaborate on this amazing project! Congrats to all 14 undergraduate authors!!!
5/18/23 Congrats to Dominique Doyle on a VERY successful undergraduate career! Everyone in the Niepielko will miss you! You are going to do amazing things at UPENN!
5/12/23 Congrats to Florencia Burian for successfully defending her master's thesis!
5/4/23 Congrats toAlexander Escobar for successfully defending his master's thesis!
4/28/23 Take Your Child to Work Day was a success! Congratulations to Giacomo Niepielko for taking his first image on the confocal microscope!
4/26/23 It was an amazing day at Kean Research Days presenting all of the wonderful discoveries that the Niepielko Lab has made this year! Special thanks to Kean's President, Dr. Repollet, for stopping by to learn about our work and taking a picture with us!
4/25/23 It was a great honor to receive Kean University's Faculty Research Mentor of the Year Award! Special thanks to my wife Angela and my niece Jenna for celebrating the moment with me!
3/4/23 Congratulations to Dominique Doyle, Gisselle Hidalgo, and Florencia Burian for presenting our research at the Annual Drosophila Research Conference in Chicago!
1/30/23 The Niepielko Lab was featured in Kean news for our latest accomplishment!
https://www.kean.edu/news/kean-professor-matthew-niepielko-receives-prestigious-nsf-award-support-genetic-research-and
1/6/23 The Niepielko Lab has received the Faculty Early Career Development (CAREER) Award from the National Science Foundation!! This funding will support the lab for the next five years and launch New Jersey's Research Alliance for Inclusive STEM Education (NJ-RAISE). Read more about the award here: Niepielko Lab CAREER Award
1/6/23 Congratulation to Dominique Doyle for receiving the prestigious Victoria Finnerty Travel Award from the Genetics Society of America to attend fly meeting in Chicago! Well deserved and good luck with your presentation!
9/27/22 A HUGE congratulations to Bianca Ortega for being awarded the Presidential Excellence in Research Award for the 2022! A special congrats to Dominique Doyle for also being nominated for this prestigious award. Keep up the good work both of you!
8/20/22 Another Successful High School Summer Research Experience in the lab! They all decided to dress up like me (backwards hats, jeans and a polo shirt)! Fantastic group! Good Luck in the future!
6/1/22 Congratulations to Florencia Burian for earning a full Graduate Research Assistantship in the lab! A special thanks to Kean University for this support!
5/10/2022 Read About our latest discoveries in the media! Faculty-Student Research Team Advances Understanding of Fertility
4/29/2022 Congratulations to Dominique Doyle for being accepted into Cornell University as a part of their Molecular Biology and Genetics Summer REU Program! Good Luck!
4/29/2022 Congratulations to Bianca Ortega for earning a summer internship at NASA’s Center for Climate Science (NCSS) at the Goddard Space Flight Center for High Performance Computing (HPC)! Good luck!
3/18/2022 The first paper from the Niepielko lab is now published in Biophysical Journal! Congrats to our graduate student Michael Valentino and undergraduates Bianca Ortega, Bianca Ulrich, and Dominique Doyle for a job well done! Read our new article "Computational modeling offers new insight into Drosophila germ granule development"
2/14/22 Congratulations to Dominique Doyle, Bianca Ortega, and Bianca Ulrich for being accepted to present a poster at the Drosophila conference in San Diego!
7/1/21 Welcome Bianca Ulrich and Milton Sanabria to the Student's Partnering with Faculty program this summer!
6/1/21 Congrats to Florencia Burian for being selected for the Chemical Bonding Fellowship at MIT! Good luck this summer and following semesters! We are looking forward to a successful collaboration with the Shalek Lab .
5/1/21 Congrats to Michael Valentino, Michael Heck, and Heena Vasoya for successfully defending! Good luck!
3/18/21 Niepielko Lab receives an Academic Research Enhancement Award (AREA) (R15) from the NIH (The Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development)!
1/3/21 Niepielko Lab receives Kean University's Distinguished Publication Award for their collaborative project with the Yakoby Lab from Rutgers University!
12/1/20
Congratulations to Bianca Ortega for receiving the XSEDE empower internship for our collaborative project with Dr. Joiner! Good Luck!
8/1/20
The Niepielko Lab virtual Bioinformatics workshop for high school students was a HUGE success! 49 students analyzed the evolution of coronaviruses using MEGA and how the coronavirus spike protein interacts with ACE2 using PyMol! The future for STEM is bright!
5/31/20- Congratulations to Sarah Bambilla, Nyeshia Yarber , and Alexander Escobar for receiving the Student's Partnering with Faculty award!
5/20/20- Congratulations to Chiemeka Okere and Fadgeolie Athouriste for successfully defending your master's thesis! Good luck in the future!
11/27/19- Welcome Research First Initiative students to the Niepielko Lab!
Welcome Florencia Burian to the Lab! Good luck with your independent study!
10/30/19- The STEM Outreach Program is now official!
8/30/19- The GSSRP was a huge success this year! Check out the news article: https://www.kean.edu/news/top-high-school-stem-students-spend-summer-learning-kean
8/1/19- Congratulations to our high school GSSRP students for successfully cloning their first genes!
7/18/19- Congratulations to our high school GSSRP students on their first successful experiment!
7/8/19- Welcome GSSRP students and assistants to The Niepielko Lab!