The Moore Lab

Welcome to the Moore Lab in the Picker Engineering Program at Smith College! 

We are a diverse and interdisciplinary team of scholars drawn from different backgrounds and majors including engineering, biology, biochemistry, chemistry, and neuroscience.  Our unifying focus is engineering proteins for applications in diagnosing and treating human disease.  

If you are a Smith student interested in opportunities to join the lab, please email Sarah Moore to find a time to meet.

Summer and Fall 2023

Welcome to Carey Dougan, Ph.D., as a postdoctoral fellow co-mentored by Sarah Moore and Maren Buck (Smith College, Chemistry).  Carey completed her Ph.D. at the University of Massachusetts Amherst in Chemical Engineering.   Her postdoctoral work is funded by a recently awarded NSF grant (PI: Maren Buck, Co-PI: Sarah Moore) titled, "RUI: Combinatorial Synthesis of Protein-Polymer Conjugates by Post-Polymerization Modification of Side-Chain Reactive Polymers."

Kristine Le '25 and Sheher-Bano '24 present their work at the ABRCMS 2023 conference. Sheher-Bano presented work from their summer REU experience, and Kristine presented work from the Moore Lab.

Sarah and Margherita share their work engineering proteins as theranostics for malignant pleural mesothelioma at the inaugural Gordon Conference on Protein Engineering.

Spring 2023

Vivien Qiao '23 gave a wonderful senior thesis presentation.  She is headed off next year to the predoctoral program at Adimab.

Many exciting summer plans for members of the Moore Lab. Kristine will be headed to an internship at Bristol Meyers Squib, Sheher-Bano will be NSF REU Fellow at the University of Virginia, Sicheng received a Praxis fellowship to pursue research at Georgia Tech, and Anya received a Praxis fellowship to pursue research at Notre Dame.

Congratulations to Sherher-Bano Ahmed and Vivien Qiao for being recognized with the 2023 Impact Award in the category of Social Justice, Inclusion, and Equity.  Sheher-Bano was recognized for service and leadership in spiritual life at Smith, and Vivien for sustained engagement in STEAM outreach through the Jandon Center for Community Engagement.

Congratulations to Sherher-Bano Ahmed '24, who will be supported by a McKinley Fellowship for a senior thesis during the 2022-2023 academic year.

Fall 2022

Welcome to Margherita Piccardi, our visiting PhD student from the University of Pisa and the University of Sienna. Margherita's research is funded by a recent grant from the AIRC Foundation for Cancer Research in Italy, awarded to Margherita's mentors at the University of Pisa, Federica Gemignani and Stefano Landi, and the Moore Lab is a key collaborator on this grant. 

Congratulations to Sherher-Bano Ahmed '24, who will be supported by a McKinley Fellowship for Spring 2022.

Welcome to Kristine Le '25, who is joining our lab as a STRIDE Scholar.

Summer 2022

Recent alum Florence Qian '22 will be joining Dyno Therapeutics this summer. 

Recent alum Yeji Lee '22 is starting as a clinical research coordinator at Boston Children's Hospital. 

We're back to hosting a full SURF crew again this year for summer research! Welcome to Sheher-Bano Ahmed '24, Sicheng Pang '24, and Anya Zhao '25, and welcome back to Yeji Lee '22 and post-doctoral collaborator Alexis Ziemba.

Some exciting summer plans away from Smith - Serena Geroe '24 will be participating in the NSF Research Experiences for Undergraduates at the University of California San Diego, and Vivien Qiao '23 will be a Cellular Pharmacology Summer Intern at Merck.

Spring 2022

Great thesis presentations from our seniors Helen, Yeji, and Flo. Thank you for all of your contributions to the lab!

Senior Maggie Boyle '22 will be headed to the Schafer Lab at UMass Medical School after graduation as a research associate - best wishes for this new chapter.

Congratulations to Helen Danielson '22 for receiving an NSF Graduate Research Fellowship!   She'll be attending Brown University to pursue a PhD in Biomedical Engineering.

Congratulations to Vivien Qiao '23 on her selection as a 2022 Goldwater Scholar!  Vivien plans to pursue research on protein-drug conjugates for her senior year honors thesis. 

Summer 2021

Recent alum Basira Daqiq '21 will join the lab of Bree Aldridge and Tufts University as a research technician.

Congratulations to Yeji Lee '22 for receiving a McKinley Fellowship to pursue a senior honors thesis!

Spring 2021

Wonderful senior capstone work from our three seniors.  Jessica and Yacine presented their honors theses, and Basira presented her Engineering Design Clinic work on a low-cost ventilator design.   We are proud of our graduates.

Congratulations to Jessica Bonsu '21 as she looks ahead to beginning her Ph.D. at Georgia Tech in Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering.

Congratulations to Yacine Fall '21 - she will be attending the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health in the fall to pursue master's work in Global Health and Population! She has received a full fellowship for this program, having been selected as a Donald Hopkins Predoctoral Scholar.

Smith College students are starting to come back to campus! Welcome to new and returning members getting back into the lab: Yacine Fall (Biology and African Studies), Jessica Bonsu (Engineering), Florence Qian (Biochemistry and Psychology), Yeji Lee (Biochemistry), Helen Danielson (Engineering and Dance), Grace Apodaca (Engineering), Vivien Qiao (Biochemistry and Engineering), and Maggie Boyle (Neuroscience).  We've missed you!

Fall 2020

Congratulations to Yacine and Jessica - both are recipients of the McKinley Fellowship to support their senior honors thesis research.

Summer 2020

Congratulations to now Dr. Allison Sirois who successfully defended her Ph.D. dissertation for the Molecular and Cellular Biology program through the University of Massachusetts, Amherst!  Allison is the first Ph.D. graduate from our lab, and has played a tremendous role in shaping who we are and the work we do. 

Spring 2020

Congratulations to Emely, Leanna, and Yanxuan, Smith College Class of 2020, on their graduation - our three seniors have all completed their senior theses with exciting plans ahead in research and medicine.  Emely will be a clinical coordinator at the Columbia fertility clinic, Leanna is pursuing immunobiology research at the Ichahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, and Yanxuan will be joining the research and development team at Elpis Biopharmaceuticals.

Congratulations to Allison who was recently awarded an NIH IRACDA Postdoctoral Fellowship at Tufts University to work in the Oudin Lab starting Fall 2020!

Congratulations to Yacine who was recently accepted into Harvard T.H. Chan’s School of Public Health summer program in epidemiology! 

Welcome to Alexis Ziemba (Class of '12) who joins as a Postdoctoral Scholar and Lecturer in Neuroscience. 

Fall 2019

Congratulations to our lab full of McKinley Fellows!  Emely, Leanna, and Yanxuan have each received a McKinley Fellowship to support their senior thesis research, and our juniors, Yacine, Jessica, and Basira are all Junior Macs, with fellowship support for their pre-honors research.  

Congratulations to Allison who was recently awarded a UMass Amherst Graduate School Dissertation Grant to help fund her molecular imaging pilot studies. 

Congratulations to Yanxuan and the entire "Blood Spinners" team who presented their Mid-Year Design Clinic progress. 

Congratulations to Allison, Daniela, Yanxuan, Yacine,  and Sarah - our lab's paper characterizing the therapeutic effects of our engineered proteins on mesothelin-expressing cancer cells has been accepted for publication and is available online.

Sirois AR, Deny DA,  Li Y, Fall YD, Moore SJ. (2019) Engineered Fn3 protein has targeted therapeutic effect on mesothelin-expressing cancer cells and increases tumor cell sensitivity to chemotherapy. Biotechnology and Bioengineering. https://doi.org/10.1002/bit.27204

Congratulations to Leanna who gave an impressive talk at her Lunchbag Presentation!

Congratulations to lab alum Daniela Deny '18 who recently accepted a research associate position at Ultragenyx Pharmaceutical!

Summer 2019

Congratulations to Allison who was awarded an MCB Leadership Scholarship!

Spring 2019

Commencement 2019

Congratulations to our graduating seniors - Naomi and Desi! We wish you all the best in your future pursuits. Naomi is headed to the Ph.D. program in Neuroscience at Northwestern, and Desi will be beginning a research associate position  in Dr. Grace Chen's lab in the Department of Immunobiology at Yale.

Congratulations to Yanxuan for receiving a SURF fellowship to pursue pre-thesis summer research at Smith on our collaborative work with the Buck Lab, engineering protein-polymer conjugates for drug delivery applications.

Congratulations to Basira, who received a PRAXIS fellowship to conduct summer research at Princeton.

Congratulations to all of our undergrads who presented their work at the 2019 Smith College Celebrating Collaborations.

Our collaborative work with the Buck Lab engineering protein-polymer conjugates for targeted drug delivery was published in Bioconjugate Chemistry! https://pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/acs.bioconjchem.9b00155 

Congratulations to Leanna, who has accepted a position in the 2019 Emergent Behaviors of Integrated Cellular Systems (EBICS) Research Experience for Undergraduates (REU) Summer Program at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

Congratulations to Jessica, who has accepted a summer research position at Stanford through the Leadership Alliance Summer Research Early Identification Program.

Congratulations to Emely, whose article about her college experience has been published in Latina Style Magazine.

http://latinastyle.com/magazine/college-beat-26/

Emely will be completing a second summer of research at Rice University, supported by an HHMI EXROP fellowship.

Leanna presented her research at the 2019 New England SACNAS Regional Meeting at Brandeis University! 

Congratulations to Yacine for accepting a position in the Summer Undergraduate Internship Program (SUIP) at UPenn!

J Term 2019

Fall 2018

Congratulations to Naomi who won Best Poster in Neuroscience at the Annual Biomedical Research Conference for Minority Students (ABRCMS)!

 Sarah and Dr. Maren Buck (Chemistry Department) co-present at the Sigma Xi Seminar Series. 

Summer 2018

Welcome to the newest S'Moore members starting as summer undergraduate researchers: 

Jessica, Desi, Yacine, Basira and Yanxuan!

Spring 2018

Congratulations to our graduating seniors- Analia, Daniela, and Sam! We will miss you!

The first Moore Lab paper on our work engineering mesothelin binders was published in PLoS ONE! https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0197029

Congratulations to Allison who passed her qualifying board and advanced to Ph.D. candidate. 

Happy Birthday Sarah!

Our annual end of year trip to Herrell's to say goodbye to Seniors, and welcome our newest members!

Back row: Jessica, Daniela, Sam, Analia, Desi, Yanxuan

Front Row:  Yacine, Sarah, Allison, Em, Naomi, Leanna

Congratulations to our Seniors; Daniela, Analia, and Sam, for defending their Honors Theses!

Congratulations to Em and Leanna for receiving McKinley Fellowships!

Congratulations to Naomi on accepting a summer research position at Rockefeller University!

Congratulations to Sam on accepting an Associate Consultant position at Clarion Healthcare!

Congratulations to all the seniors on their final Rally Day!

J Term 2018

Congratulations to Sam for accepting an internship at Medtronic!

Congratulations to Em for being awarded an HHMI EXROP fellowship!

Congratulations to lab alum Anisha - she'll be pursuing a Ph.D. in Chemistry at UC Berkeley after a year long Fulbright Fellowship.